Pathology
by Starwind77
Summary: A mysterious illness sweeps through the streets of downtown New Jersey, leaving panic and dread in its wake. As the deadly plague's toll reaches national crisis, it is clear that only one certainty remains — everybody lies.
1. Prologue

**Title:** Pathology  
**Rating:** R for dark themes and disturbing imagery  
**Pairing:** House/Wilson eventually  
**Description:** At the height of flu season, a mysterious illness sweeps through the streets of downtown New Jersey, leaving panic and dread in its wake. Patients are frightened, doctors stumped, and even the eminent Dr. Gregory House is baffled by the virus's origins. As the deadly plague's toll reaches national crisis and even the government's elite can find no answer, it is clear that only one certainty remains - everybody lies.  
**Author's Note:** A House/24/The Stand crossover (yes, a three-way, but really the main focus is on House) co-authored by myself and melanthev. Originally inspired by crack conversations about what the House crew would do at the end of the world, this plot bunny actually evolved into quite a complex head case spanning just about every kind of medical jargon, government conspiracy, and Freudian nutjob in existence. You don't have to know anything about _24_ or _The Stand_ to understand the story, although it might help you get some of the references in later chapters.

Midnight, October 27th.

In the quiet outskirts of Princeton, New Jersey, tucked comfortably away from crowded highways and smoke-ridden metropolises, all lay calm. Still. It was Saturday evening, after all, and everyone who was anyone in the town had headed over to the autumn bash at Christina Laudenbaum's home, their suburb's resident party hostess, city socialite, and (to those few who knew her well) sometimes drug addict of the Valium kind. Laudenbaum was famous for giving lavish celebrations around this time of the month, when not five years ago, her husband passed away in a horrible, tragic accident (the details of which were still discussed on and off behind closed doors), and in a suburb that was not averse to good food or even better gossip, her parties were almost unanimously attended.

Almost.

Flickering, unsteady candlelight illuminated a dank basement on the far edges of town, wreathed with black ribbons and old cobwebs. The place was abandoned some years ago, after the original owners were run out of town following an unfortunate dispute with the mayor, and ever since, had stood as a warning against the perils of small town politics. Now, however, it was again reoccupied. By a cult, no less.

Inside the dimly lit room, four cloaked figures stood around a central table, heads bowed as they chanted softly in unison. Each held a golden (well, technically spray-painted tin) chalice in hand, filled to the brim with dark red liquid. Various paraphernalia, including a pentacle, broadsword, devil wings, Crusader helm, human skeleton (made in China), and at least _three_ different herbal incenses, two of which refused to burn, lay scattered about the concrete floor. Mildew was added for extra effect.

Michael was pretty sure the real stench of mildew actually emanated from John's socks.

"Third edition sucks."

The other four figures ceased their chanting to turn an annoyed look at their companion.

"Look, I'm not saying a coupla the rule changes aren't valid. But is it _really_ necessary to get rid of all the mythos priests except for druids?"

"Michael..." Paul began, rolling his eyes at this age-old debate. Every time it was John's turn to DM, they got into the same tired argument over editions.

"I mean, really. Druids? How do they expect us to just ditch everything else like that?"

"Michael, we are not here to debate the merits of a human _game_," John cut in severely. "We are here to worship the eminent power of Lord Diabolo."

"Oh, cut the crap, John." Paul really couldn't stand the other's over-dramatic pronouncements any longer. "If you don't want to play third edition, Mike, then by all means, go and start your own campaign. But while you're here in ours, would you kindly _shut up_ and learn to deal."

"Now stop stalling with the summon spell already."

Michael looked like he was about to retort, but then caught a sharp glare from Ben, who had thus far kept silent, and bit his tongue. Ben was the oldest player among them. Ben also worked at the local video game store and supplied all their DND books. One really did not want to piss Ben off.

Begrudgingly, Michael stepped back from the table and raised his chalice into the air, eyes sliding closed as he began to murmur the words to the spell.

"Raging fire, tongues of flame. Heed the call of your dark master." A sudden bout of vertigo hit him, and he paused, waiting for the dizziness to go away. Damn that incense. John always overdid it burning six sticks at once. 

Ignoring the mounting nausea, Michael raised his voice to complete the chant. "By the power of Cthullu, I summon thee, great harbinger of the dark!" He brought the chalice to his lips and downed the warm liquid in several gulps, then took his place once more back within the circle.

"Now, if this thing only tas - " Abruptly, he swerved, vision blurring to a pitched grey as he threw out an arm to steady himself. The table rocked from his sudden weight.

"What the hell are you doing?" John snapped in annoyance. Of all the lameass ways to ruin the ceremony...

His voice changed, however, when he saw the ill look on his friend's face. "Hey, you all right?"

Ben squinted in the dim lighting. "Don't puke all over my books now."

Michael waved off the look of concern, as he pulled himself back up. "Yeah, just...just the stupid herbs." He shook his head, trying to clear it. "The hell did that Korean guy sell you?"

"Just the usual stuff."

"Right. Spiked with valerian root," Michael muttered. "I'm gonna go get some water."

He trotted off several steps, shutting his ears to the shrill protest John would no doubt put up for screwing up their "summoning" and opening the doors to chaos or some such. This whole night was supposed to be his turn to DM anyway, but of course, thanks to that bitch Laudenbaum's party, they had to reschedule to late night and then of course Paul insisted on switching the campaign rules and why the fuck was the room tilting so suddenly anyway? You couldn't be telling him that -

Three heads turned at the sound of a fourth collapsing. Ben was the first to get to him and push his hood back, flipping the boy over onto his back as his other companions gathered around worriedly. Michael looked up at the congregation of dark cloaks with a glazed eye. Cloak? Coke? Where exactly was the...

With an effort, he managed to murmur one last word before passing out entirely.

"...Water."


	2. Chapter 1

**Title:** Pathology  
**Rating:** R for dark themes and disturbing imagery  
**Pairing:** House/Wilson eventually  
**Description:** At the height of flu season, a mysterious illness sweeps through the streets of downtown New Jersey, leaving panic and dread in its wake. Patients are frightened, doctors stumped, and even the eminent Dr. Gregory House is baffled by the virus's origins. As the deadly plague's toll reaches national crisis and even the government's elite can find no answer, it is clear that only one certainty remains - everybody lies.  
**Author's Note:** A House/24/The Stand crossover (yes, a three-way, but really the main focus is on House) co-authored by myself and melanthev. Originally inspired by crack conversations about what the House crew would do at the end of the world, this plot bunny actually evolved into quite a complex head case spanning just about every kind of medical jargon, government conspiracy, and Freudian nutjob in existence. You don't have to know anything about _24_ or _The Stand_ to understand the story, although it might help you get some of the references in later chapters.

The phone was ringing.

Its abrupt shrillness cut through the melody of the piano for the second time in the past sixty minutes, causing a skip and a pause from the maestro at the ivory keys. House glanced up for roughly two seconds before turning back to his music, obstinately ignoring the discordant clash of the two sounds. Answering machines were invented for a reason. He'd switched the voice mail settings to the lowest number of rings possible upon purchasing the device, his personal theory being that, if it didn't warrant his attention by the third mind-numbing peal, then the person on the other line wasn't likely to convince him otherwise.

...With one unfortunate exception. House sighed and halted his playing, his mood lost after that last thought. Of course, there was the slim chance that this time, it was merely a wrong number, or even a telemarketer--at least then he could practice his Mandarin and have some fun--but he doubted he would be so fortunate.

No, the odds of it being Cuddy on the other line was a statistical anomaly comparable in size to his Vicodin tally within the next hour if these calls didn't let up. Half hour, even, given their persistence. And the odds that she was going to stick him with clinic duty once he picked up the call, as he inevitably would when his painkillers ran out (she always made good use of the pharmaceutical advantage), well, that was mathematical certainty considering the previous two voice mails had been direct deposit straight from the seventh circle of hell. No, scratch that. Hell would be far more amusing. Cuddy in clinic, on the other hand, was simply flu season run amok. Nothing even as remotely entertaining as pitchforks and flames and a guy with twin horns who sported the world's worst case of skin cancer (Wilson could vouch for it; he'd had dinner with the Devil not too long ago, after all).

As his answering machine kicked in with the all-too-familiar voice of his boss on the other line, House finally gave in and popped one of the little white pills sitting on his piano top. There was only so much a man could take, after all.

"House. The hospital's burning down." That flat, matter-of-fact declaration stopped him right in his pill-to-mouth tracks. "You might want to come in and remove your things before the firemen use them to barricade the flames." She paused thoughtfully, then added, "Also, your whiteboard's been doused in sodium bicarbonate. Have a nice day." The phone clicked off, leaving House to sit in deafening silence.

He blinked once, then slowly allowed the pill to finish its path into his mouth and down his throat.

So...statistical calculations. Not so effective with Cuddy, it seemed. House pondered the message idly, as his fingers counted off the number of Vicodin tablets left within his possession before he had to restock. The woman was getting creative. First, the lice issues. Then, a shutdown of network power. And now, she had him cornered with a hospital fire. At this rate, they'd be killing firstborns by daybreak. Not that he was really worried, of course. This last message was just another instance of Cuddy getting back at him for ten unanswered house calls, five pager rings, and a week's worth of hiding out in the ob-gyn lounge, his current sanctum from the wiles of the Wicked Witch. House was pretty sure that if there really was a fire at Princeton-Plainsboro, his belongings wouldn't rate very high on her list of Things Not to Barbeque.

But. The Vicodin. Dejectedly, he looked down at the six remaining pills sitting on his piano top. House figured the likelihood of these lasting him for the rest of the day amounted to just under nil, somewhere between _really_ unlikely and hey, is that a chess piece in your pocket or did you just get sold into netspeak slavery? He'd have to go to the pharmacy at some point, whether he liked it or not. The only question at this point was, how many painkillers would he spare to face the Mistress of Misery (Purveyor of Pain, Afflicter of Agony, Destroyer of Doom...he still couldn't come up with something for "Queen" though) who would be invariably greeting him there.

Facing Cuddy on empty was not too bright of a notion.

...Particularly if she _had_ doused his whiteboard, as she'd claimed. Because he really did like his whiteboard. It was the only object in his office that could mock Foreman just by virtue of standing there.

Reluctantly easing himself off the hardwood bench, House made his way over to where his phone sat and picked up the receiver, pushing the redial button as he began to count off the seconds until he received an answer.

He got to about one - half of one, in fact - before Cuddy snapped it up. "They're moving out your bookshelves right now. Shall I tell them to hold out on the desk?"

House shifted slightly, tapping his cane against the floor while he held the receiver in his other hand. "So my desk has been promoted from object to patient status now?"

"From the amount of patients you've seen this week, that's actually a good sign."

"I've seen plenty of patients," House replied, adding an air of mock-insult to his voice as he headed over to the kitchen. Listening to Cuddy in PMS mode always required copious amounts of refreshment to sustain. "ER's on reruns now, you know," he continued.

He yanked open the fridge, resting one arm on the door. Ever since Wilson left, the interior of his refrigerator had been pitifully devoid of much food (at least, that of the stove-cooked and edible kind), but he still recalled keeping a few items stashed away in the back. House rifled around, pushing aside a half-empty can of Campbell's soup, various slices of sandwich meat, peanut butter, old take-out containers, Red Bull, and a neatly-wrapped platter of stuffed peppers with the "Property of James Wilson" label still stuck on it. House paused, thumbing the note. He couldn't say why he hadn't thrown the thing out yet; it'd been nearly a month since James's impromptu stay had ended, after all, cut short by a flurry of phone calls and the other's inability to keep his pants up around pretty damsels in distress. House hoped cancer patient #2473 was having the remission of her life back in Florence.

Cuddy's voice interrupted his thoughts. "Right. And all of them had their bills sent to Princeton-Plainsboro." A loud clank sounded in the background, followed by several people yelling. The ruckus stopped House's prepared retort short. What were they doing now, disemboweling his cabinet range? Busting out his windows? Was nothing sacred under the reign of the Wicked Witch?

Shrugging aside the thought, House removed the remnants of the Reuben sandwich he was looking for and took a bite, chewing purposefully loud to irritate Cuddy on the other line. "Oh look, there goes your state-of-the-art computer into the flames." Her voice took on a smug tone. "So much for Pacman the rest of this month, huh?"

House paused for a second, mid-chew, then swallowed. He still didn't think the hospital was on fire, but he also didn't think his computer was safe either.

"Well, now," he said finally, "Chase is going to be upset - I didn't get a chance to back up his porn yet."

"Ah, but luckily, Chase also arrived for work on time today. Something I can't say for you," Cuddy replied without missing a beat. There was another, louder clank from inside her room, followed by the unmistakable rush of water. Several seconds went by before it stopped. "I'll give you ten minutes to get in here, House, or else your office is fried."

That last, inexorable click effectively sealed his Vicodin quota for the day. 

House set the receiver down on the kitchen counter with a sigh and shoved his sandwich back into the fridge. Fire or not, he wasn't about to risk the loss of his beloved computer, with all its high scores in Minesweeper, Freecell, Hearts, Pinball, Backgammon, Breakout, Metroid, Swarm, and yes, even Pacman (he had nearly beaten the last level before Chase walked in and ruined his streak) saved on it. The cost-benefit ratio had just tipped dramatically. With a resigned air, he began gathering his things, silently ticking off the activities he'd rather be engaging in than traveling into an infected air zone. Getting sick was bad enough, but with the flu? The common, garden variety _flu_? That was just an insult to his immune system! House always figured that if he was going to come down with something, it had to at least begin with some sort of baffling collapse and progress into a series of ever more outrageous, unexplainable symptoms that consisted of more than just toilet bowl prayer and a box of Kleenex.

No better way to impress the ladies than to tell them you have one of the last known Western strains of Oropouche virus, after all.

Perhaps he could bribe Cuddy into setting up a webcam over the clinic area so he could diagnose patients without even having to enter the waiting room. It would be like his own reality TV show, complete with stupid people doing stupid things. Maybe if he was lucky, he'd get to witness the making of a Darwin Award in person.

...And maybe, just maybe, if he was _really_ lucky, someone would run into the clinic with an illness that wasn't symptomatic of the failure of the human race.


	3. Chapter 2

**Title:** Pathology  
**Rating:** R for dark themes and disturbing imagery  
**Pairing:** House/Wilson eventually  
**Description:** At the height of flu season, a mysterious illness sweeps through the streets of downtown New Jersey, leaving panic and dread in its wake. Patients are frightened, doctors stumped, and even the eminent Dr. Gregory House is baffled by the virus's origins. As the deadly plague's toll reaches national crisis and even the government's elite can find no answer, it is clear that only one certainty remains - everybody lies.  
**Author's Note:** A House/24/The Stand crossover (yes, a three-way, but really the main focus is on House) co-authored by myself and melanthev. Originally inspired by crack conversations about what the House crew would do at the end of the world, this plot bunny actually evolved into quite a complex head case spanning just about every kind of medical jargon, government conspiracy, and Freudian nutjob in existence. You don't have to know anything about _24_ or _The Stand_ to understand the story, although it might help you get some of the references in later chapters.

"Come to pick up Pacman's urn?"

House stopped short at the sound of that familiar voice. Clipped. Sardonic. And always, always displeased. It was a shame too, because he'd nearly made it to the pharmacy intact, after having threaded his way carefully through the brush behind Wilson's office and letting himself in with the spare key he had borrowed (not stolen) from his friend's briefcase a month before. Obviously, his boss had been expecting this.

Turning, House put on his best sarcastic smile.

"I'd hoped to make the funeral, but you know how traffic is during these emergencies." He waved a hand at the parking lot, which was completely devoid of any firefighting equipment whatsoever.

"Well, the blaze only seemed to attack your office. Hence." Cuddy waved a hand at the parking lot as well.

House pretended to do a double-take. "X-men powers. Wow. I always wondered how Magma would look like in real life."

"It's a shame you hadn't come in earlier to look, then," she clipped in her no-nonsense voice and then handed him a clipboard. "Exam Room One."

With obvious dread, House's gaze followed the direction of her finger through the glass doors of the clinic and into the common room, which was currently occupied by every manner of hacking, coughing, sneezing, or otherwise disease-spreading patient in the course of human existence, all just waiting to be cured by the divine hand of man.

...It was times like these that he wished more people would rely on faith healing.

"I'm pretty sure you don't mean _that_ Exam Room One." Fake incredulity fairly dripped from his voice. "Because it would require, you know, walking through the equivalent of plague-ridden Russia."

"Yeah, God forbid there be sick people in a hospital." Cuddy rolled her eyes. "The most they have is the flu. And as far as I know, you've never gotten the flu anyway."

"I'd like to keep it that way."

"Then _deal_, or get vaccinated like the rest of us."

She marched off without another word, leaving House to flounder at the mercy of the masses.

The cold, unfeeling masses. 

-- o --

"Don't have _flu_." The last word was spat out as though it were a curse.

House closed the door behind him slowly in resignation, his movements that of a condemned man being led to the guillotine of human idiocy. The most dangerous kind, at that. His eyes scanned the owner of the voice – black hair (slight oil build-up of roughly two days), black eyes, painted eyebrows. Of the Asian variety.

He gingerly made his way toward her.

"Don't have flu," she repeated stubbornly.

"No, really?" he asked in mock-horror. "But influenza's all the rage these days!"

"Not! Flu!" She emitted a hacking cough, as though to prove her point. House carefully sidestepped the direction her mouth had been aimed in. "Sah-veeah ah-cute res-pee-rah-to-reeeh sin-drome."

Having walked clear to the other side of the room by now, House turned around slowly, one eyebrow raised. "Communist state finally decide to tell its people what they're dying of, eh? Or was that Google talking? Because you know, I always figured Google would become the new dictatorship someday. The stalker maps…the filtered images…the colorful, yet insidiously arranged banner motifs…great way to spread propaganda around."

There was a moment of silence as his "SARS" patient stared back at him blankly. House averted his gaze. Something about avoiding direct eye contact with the criminally insane, very shrewd advice considering the state of the last clinic patient who had wandered into here. Ever since that Russian conspiracy debacle, he'd been careful to screen all visitors.

After several minutes, the woman seemed to recover from his shocking accusation about despotic search engines and sniffled once, then rubbed her ear.

"S-A-R-S," she enunciated slowly, as though speaking to the deaf and senile. "It called SARS."

_Yes, thank you for the clarification. Completely didn't comprehend that from your awful butchering of the name the first time._

"Is it, now? Say ah." He stuck a thermometer between her lips. "Let's see here. Runny nose, dry cough..." He pulled out the thermometer. "Temperature of a hundred and two. You keep messing with your ear – either you're deaf, or you've got an earache."

"Earache!" She nodded vigorously.

"Ahhh...see, the commies are always lying to you people." He scribbled out a quick prescription for an antibiotic and ripped the sheet off the pad with a flourish. "I deem you with a sinus infection. Now go get cured. Be happy."

She made no move to take the prescription. "Not sai-nus in-fec-shee-un. SARS."

_Dear God._

_I would like to let you know that I am currently feeling deeply religious today. This is even more unusual than Cuddy giving me a Get Out of Clinic Free card during PMS week, so in return for my rare moment of faith in you, please, in the name of Angelina Jolie's breasts, smite this woman down._

"Eat place. Chaaaiii-nah." Her fingers pantomimed a chopstick motion. "_One_ month ago. _One_," she stated, holding up a single index finger to emphasize the number. "SARS."

"Eradication of SARS by WHO? Two years ago." House held up two fingers. "_Two_. No SARS." He dropped his hand and began pacing along the length of the room. Just fifteen minutes into clinic, and his leg pain was already flaring up more than usual. Distractedly, he reached into his pocket for another Vicodin pill. Last one's the charm (or in his case, the charmingly _bleak_ harbinger of a torrent of agony). He'd need to make a pharmacy run within the next ten minutes if he wanted to avoid Cuddy returning from lunch. That is, should his English-challenged patient ever bother to…

House paused, the distinct feeling of twin eyes boring into his back. The woman was watching him intently.

"What? Mao Ze Dong got your tongue?"

"Your cane. _Bad_ feng shui," she said, nodding gravely and coughing again. "Hold on _left_ side. To balance."

For about two seconds, House was speechless. Then, he began contemplating the merits of physician-assisted suicide by way of blunt force trauma to the head. They did take into account overwhelming circumstances in court, after all.

In the end however, he bit his tongue and put on his best I-live-among-the-tortured look, leaned in to emphasize every single syllable of his next pronouncement.

"Your cough," House enunciated in the worst Chinese accent ever. "Bad eel-ness. Take thees _medicine_ to ba-lance." He tapped the prescription with his cane – his cane, which was in his _right_ hand – and turned to leave before the look of shock could disappear from the woman's face.

"Two a day," he said, as he walked out. "Morning. Night. Yin. Yang. Got it?"

He didn't look back to make sure she did.

-- o --

"Stocking up, House? Or did Cuddy make you pick up your patients' prescriptions, too?"

House didn't even turn around, recognizing the voice behind him as Wilson's immediately. "If it were the latter, I'd be upstairs in the psych ward." He tapped his cane impatiently against the countertop. "Praying."

As he waited with some irritation for his prescription to arrive, House glanced idly over at his companion, mind already singling out the details of dress for future analysis. Oxford shirt. Rolled up sleeves. Tie. Hm. Blue and orange stripes today. Obviously, staff "appreciation" week was in full swing.

Wilson joined House at the counter, resting a casual arm on it as he regarded his companion. "So, how much of a head start on Cuddy did you give yourself?"

House tilted his head, pondering for a second as he peered into the air in deep thought. "As of right now? About two salads' worth. Three and a Ben & Jerry's if it's getting around to that time of the month."

Wilson gave him an incredulous look. "_Food_ is your new timing system?"

"It's _always_ been my timing system." House's voice took on an awed, hushed tone. "Can you imagine what would've happened if the Egyptians used salad bars instead of sundials for their clocks? Asparagus would be the new in!"

"Asparagus." There was definite skepticism in the other's voice. "And if it were the Greeks? Would it still be asparagus?"

"No, I'm thinking more along the lines of stuffed sausage. You know, like stuffed peppers, except without the vomit." House paused for a beat. "Or the peppers."

"I should notify Cuddy that my stuffed peppers can be used as a weapon against you."

"Now, _that_ would be an interesting scene." One could almost hear a collective sigh of "Thank God" as the pharmacist returned. House immediately swiped up the bag of Vicodin and rifled through it before turning a critical eye on the man behind the counter. "Child-proof bottles?" he demanded. "Where did _you_ go to the medical school?" He walked off without waiting for a response. "Because I just so happen to know that Cuddy and peppers go together about as well as clinic duty and me."

Wilson fell easily into step beside House. "Is that my cue to ask you how your time in the clinic went so you can complain?"

House pretended to seriously contemplate the question. "Only if it's my cue to mock you for actually caring for these idiots."

"They don't all remind me of you, you know."

"No?" House's voice took on a fake, wobbly tone. "Not even the brave cancer kid with the big puppy dog eyes?"

Wilson raised an eyebrow and chuckled. "I wouldn't call any part of you puppy." He wouldn't call any part of House animal at all, unless that animal consisted of a porcupine with a double layer of quills. And a limp. One wondered what redeeming qualities either of those had. "Speaking of puppies, I'm pretty sure none of your patients drew a cocker spaniel with a chocolate-scented marker only to eat the entire picture."

House paused for a beat, then curled his lips into a smirk. "Is this going where I think it's going?"

Wilson returned the smirk twofold. "You may have topped me last time, but you're not topping that particular patient."

"No, because only wonder boy oncologist is allowed to top patients around here." House gave a false gasp. "Oh, I'm sorry. Did I hit a nerve?"

Wilson paused in his steps for a split second before continuing on, the smirk disappearing from his lips. "Going for the cheap shots because you're lacking a story to share? Now _that's_ new," he remarked dryly.

House frowned, considering. "Asian woman," he said finally. "30 years old. Absolutely convinced she was dying of a Communist disease called SARS." He glanced at Wilson, clearly amused. "Too bad her symptoms showed up about two years too late to make the cut."

They walked on for several moments in silence.

"...Is my feng shui bad?" he asked suddenly.

Wilson lifted an eyebrow, pretending to reflect seriously upon the question. "No, it's great. You're just bursting with positive energy."

"That's what my acupuncturist said right before she sued me." Suddenly, House made a sharp swerve down another hallway.

Wilson blinked in surprise before following uncertainly along. "What – where are you going?"

"Back to Kansas," the other hissed, eyes on a certain femme fatale who had just made an appearance by the pharmacy. "The Wicked Witch is looking for us." He quickly turned into the back of the prescription storage area.

"You mean she's looking for _you_," Wilson replied. He was two steps away from entering the storage room along with House, but the echo of heels behind stopped him. So he slammed the door instead.

"Aiding and abetting?" Cuddy asked as she stopped in front of him. There was a hint of irony in that tone.

Wilson just smiled sweetly and kept silent. Guilt hidden beneath plenty of layers of "I have nothing to do with this" innocence.

Cuddy snorted. "You two are the worst liars ever." She moved past him to rap on the door. "House! I know you're in there."

House leaned against the wall beside the door, careful to remain on the unhinged side so as not to get smacked in the face should Cuddy force it open. "It's not what you think it is!" he called brightly. "I know it looks like we're ditching clinic duty, but we're actually having sex. Wilson's just bad at the closet-banging part." He bolted the door shut for emphasis.

The stretch of silence from Wilson this time was longer. House wondered briefly if his friend was blushing. Probably. Wilson always blushed when he mentioned sex around Cuddy, as if red-faced embarrassment could hide the fact that everyone knew he was actually an incorrigible lecher.

At last, the other man cleared his throat. "I'm actually on a legitimate break. Which is…over now, so I'm going to head back," he finished hastily, footsteps fading quickly as he made his escape.

Hmph. So much for undying loyalty.

Cuddy knocked on the door again. "If you're so adamant on staying in a room, I could easily lock you in Exam Room One. They're the same size."

"But this one's more comfy!" House whined mockingly. "Besides, it's got great accommodations – king size bed, panoramic view, a Vicodin stash that could last me into the next century..."

"Stock up later, House," the other replied dryly. "There's no Apocalypse yet. Are you going to come out or does there need to be another fire?"

A moment's pause before House opened the door and stuck his head out. "Foreman must be _really_ good at getting away with arson then."

Cuddy gave a humorless smile. "If only you were so good at getting away with deserting your post."

House snapped his fingers in disappointment. "Damn, so _that's_ what screwed up my GPA in medical school."

He only received a look in response before Cuddy pushed the chart into his hand. "New patient, and no flu as a bonus. Get back to work."

-- o --

"Hi, my name is Dr. Gregory House, I'll be your attending physician today. I am also obligated to inform you that my current pain medication – " He brandished his Vicodin bottle " – has the unfortunate tendency to throw me into random fits of uncontrollable rage, hysteria, madness, and acute, homicidal psychosis preceded by repeated banging of my head against the wall."

_Or your head against my cane_, he added silently to himself.

"So. Should you feel the need to leave at any time, please _run_, do not walk, to the nearest exit. A resident serf will be right with you."

That should just about do it. If the patient wasn't already heading for the door, he most definitely would be by the third dose of Vicodin pills. House congratulated himself on a job well done. And turned to witness the bloodiest sight since that box cutter circumcision several weeks ago.

"...I was clipping my scrotum."

House wrinkled his nose. "With what, the garden shears?"

He regretted asking almost immediately.

"You know how your pubic hair'll sometimes get caught in the mouth of your penis, so when you go to pee, it squirts one way and then another and you end up peeing on yourself?"

"...No."

"Well." The patient blinked. "Yours is probably bigger than mine then."

"Was it the cane that gave it away?" House asked mockingly.

Turning, he rifled through the drawers for some bandages and disinfectant. Paused temptingly over the scissors. A swipe. One swipe, and all of humanity would be saved. The Hippocratic Oath was overrated anyway.

Meanwhile, the patient continued babbling on, completely oblivious to how close his family jewels were from becoming permanently removed. "So...um, I was trimming my hair when I accidentally slipped and – "

_Fell out of the gene pool,_ House prayed.

" – cut off a piece of my skin down, um, there, and it was bleeding a lot, and I couldn't get a bandaid on it, and the medical kit was too far away, so…"

"Yeah, yeah, get to the point already. Did you saw it off yourself, or were you waiting for the surgeon to give you the go-ahea...oh, good GOD." House froze mid-turn, his eyes riveted by the horrible sight before him. The patient had dropped his pants.

"Is that a...?"

"So I used a Cheetos bag clip instead." The man shifted uncomfortably under the other's stare. "Is that, uh, not safe?"

Famous last words of the omega male. House decided to have some fun at the expense of the village idiot.

"Not safe! Do you realize how much pressure those clips can put on you?" House frowned in the most ominous way possible, voice taking on a dark, somber tone like those TV doctors when they were informing a patient of a particularly dangerous and debilitating disease. The end result resembled something of a grim reaper. "Several dozen pounds! Cuts off the blood flow _entirely_, makes the appendage go flaccid and numb like a fish within hours of application. I've seen amputations resulting from severe R.A.P.E syndrome."

"Oh, my God!" With a cry, the man yanked the clip off his scrotum and threw it straight across the room, eyes bulging in fear. The clip flipped twice in mid-air, bounced once on the wall, made a perfect backspin, before finally skittering to a halt next to the corner trash can.

The patient eyed it with all the wariness of a cornered hyena.

"So, what exactly does...uh...R.A.P – whatever that thing is, stand for?" he tentatively asked after several moments of silence.

House couldn't resist a smirk. "Reverse Aggravated Penis Envy."

For a moment, the other man was speechless. "They should...they should caution consumers about this! Expose these companies! Just the horror of the thought alone makes me want to…"

"Yeah, those things _really_ should have warning labels. Wouldn't want someone to mistake the bright yellow safety clip for a bandaid." House's sarcasm had reached toxic levels by now.

...And the patient finally caught on.

"I didn't want it to get infected!"

"Right. So you used processed cheese instead of hydrogen peroxide." Sadly, it was time to send the village idiot on his way. House quickly scribbled off a prescription for a Td booster and gel foam dressing, then shoved the piece of paper at the other man. "Give this to one of the nurses when you go out. They'll get it fixed up." Turning to leave, he couldn't resist adding one more snide quip.

"Oh, and next time you clip your Cheeto? May want to leave it on longer. You could win an award."

House left the patient to ponder which kind of award it might be.

-- o --

Escaping the dreaded Exam Room One yet again, House slunk along the hallway, cane in hand, eyes set on the destination that would mean his salvation from eternal stupidity. The ob-gyn lounge. Reclining couch, widescreen TV, a location as far away from the clinic as physically possible (well, technically, the neonatal ward was farthest, but that option presented its own set of long and arduous problems, not the least of which involved Chase)...All he had to do now was make it through the next five seconds without being stopped by –

"House!"

_Speak of the devil. Literally._

House paused in his footsteps and sighed, turning reluctantly to face the source of the nagging voice. Cuddy had ambushed him again. From the stairs, no less. Sometimes, he wondered if this weren't the real curse of having a lame leg.

"What?" he asked. "I'm on a legitimate break here. I have fifteen minutes, or did that slip your mind?"

"Yeah." Cuddy strode forward. "And you used them up at the pharmacy, or did _that_ slip your mind?"

"You can't yell at me and then say I was on a legitimate break," House replied, waving his cane briefly in her direction. "You can't have your dictatorship and run it too. Just look at what happened to Germany."

"Are you comparing me to a Nazi?" Cuddy asked in disbelief.

"Is that what they call them these days?" he responded with equal incredulity.

There's a moment when he's sure he finally crossed the line from just mildly irritated Cuddy to I'm-gonna -lock-you-into-clinic-for-a-week Cuddy. Which, given the current circumstances, wasn't much of a change.

But then, his boss just rolled her eyes in exasperation. "That metaphor makes no sense anyway." She whipped out a folder and shoved it in his hands for the third time in the past two hours. "New patient – "

House waved a hand. "I'm familiar. Exam Room One, etcetera, etcetera. Can't we just print stickers that say FLU in bold red letters and hand them out to the patients? It'll be like a business promotion."

"_Non_ clinic patient," Cuddy said, raising an eyebrow.

House immediately took the folder. "See, now why didn't you say that earlier?" He began walking away, expertly balancing the folder open with his left hand while he manipulated his cane with his right, weaving through the throngs of nurses nearby. It only took him a few steps before it clicked that the symptoms apparently added up to –

The flu.

Wonderful. Why had Cuddy even given this to him?

He turned around, but his boss had expertly disappeared. To be replaced by an elderly woman with the largest bundle of Kleenex ever. House surreptitiously continued on his way.

_Maybe it's a "special" flu,_ he thought dryly, swinging open the door to the hospital room to see a young guy of about eighteen, surrounded by a bunch of his friends.

Wearing...

House blinked. "Grim Reapers come to harvest souls?" he remarked, eyeing the black cloaks each had on. "The hospital must be having a yard sale."

He made his way to the foot of the bed and tapped his cane against the metal frame. "So. Michael. Mike?" He tilted his head, considering momentarily. "Anyway. Nausea, dizziness, fever, collapse due to fatigue. You caught the flu strain that's been going around, nothing serious." He gave a casual shrug. "Might let you hang around overnight. Why'd you even call 911?"

One of the boys scratched his head. "I – well, he collapsed and kinda blacked out for a sec – "

"Wait." House flipped through the file. "Doesn't say anything about him blacking out, just says he collapsed."

"Just for a bit," Michael said.

"Define 'a bit.'"

Another of his friends stepped forward this time. "Maybe four, five minutes max."

House glanced down at the file again. Still probably wasn't anything serious. But nothing was as boring as the flu.

He'd take what he could get for now.


	4. Chapter 3

**Title:** Pathology  
**Rating:** R for dark themes and disturbing imagery  
**Pairing:** House/Wilson eventually  
**Description:** At the height of flu season, a mysterious illness sweeps through the streets of downtown New Jersey, leaving panic and dread in its wake. Patients are frightened, doctors stumped, and even the eminent Dr. Gregory House is baffled by the virus's origins. As the deadly plague's toll reaches national crisis and even the government's elite can find no answer, it is clear that only one certainty remains - everybody lies.  
**Author's Note:** A House/24/The Stand crossover (yes, a three-way, but really the main focus is on House) co-authored by myself and melanthev. Originally inspired by crack conversations about what the House crew would do at the end of the world, this plot bunny actually evolved into quite a complex head case spanning just about every kind of medical jargon, government conspiracy, and Freudian nutjob in existence. You don't have to know anything about _24_ or _The Stand_ to understand the story, although it might help you get some of the references in later chapters. Special thanks to mercystars for donating the pepper story, which is, in fact, a true occurrence.

"Maybe he's got TB." Chase shifted a chance glance out of the corner of his eyes at House in anticipation of his diagnosis being accepted. Or shot down. Foreman, however, got there first.

"He has zero of the risk factors."

"You mean, from what he's told us, he has zero of the risk factors." Chase turned to the left to face his colleague, his elbow resting casually on the center table. The pencil in his hand hovered several inches from his lips. "Patient's probably hiding something like they all do." An almost violent slam of glass on wood caused him to jump slightly and immediately lift his arm before cautiously setting it back down again.

Three sets of eyes turned briefly in the direction of the noise. Foreman's registered irritation, but he opted to make no comment, turning back to the differential diagnosis instead.

"Or _maybe_ it's not TB."

Chase gave the end of his pencil a defeated chomp. Silence settled in for roughly three seconds before Cameron chased it away.

"You know, it could just be food poisoning," she said. "They were playing around down there, maybe something was eaten during their..." She paused, searching for a sufficient word. "...ceremony."

A scoff from Chase. "Like what, leftover Halloween lollies?" He'd managed to catch sight of the Dracula capes the kids had come in with.

Cameron, on the way to getting a caffeinated refill for her mug, turned around. "Well, some people _do_ poison the candy they give out," she said seriously, her free hand resting in her lab coat pocket. "It's like wrapping toilet paper around houses isn't enough for them."

Chase dismissed the comment, not watching as Cameron lifted the pot and poured out some coffee. "He's not complaining of any stomach problems, anyway, and besi – "

Another abrupt slam cut him off. The folder on the table hopped a quarter of an inch towards him.

Foreman made an exasperated noise. "House, what are you _doing_?"

House glanced up, eyes mockingly wide as if he had just been caught stealing or eavesdropping or having sex in public. Although in this case, he was actually…

"Drinking." He waved a hand flippantly. "Or imbibing liquid to replenish the body's supply of H2O. Whichever makes the most sense to your little mind."

Foreman raised an eyebrow skeptically, letting his gaze drop several notches to rest on the amber-and-black bottle currently sitting on his boss's desk. "Jack Daniel's whiskey?"

House poured out another shot, but didn't knock any back this time. "I hear it's great for cold prevention." Standing up, he made his way to the whiteboard. He hooked his cane onto the top edge, then uncapped a black marker and scrawled out the word FLU in big, bold letters across the top.

"Differential diagnosis, people." He rapped his knuckles against the board. "The flu. What causes it, but with the fun side effect of sudden onset blackouts?"

"Wait, blackout?" Cameron pushed off from where she was leaning on the counter, setting down her coffee mug. "The file never said anything about a – "

"Did I ask for a diagnosis or a critique of my history collection abilities?" House stared into the air quizzically, as though searching for an answer from some unknown god. "Hmm..." He turned back to the whiteboard. "Let me reread the words on here..."

"Flu can cause dehydration," Chase said. "Dehydration can lead to a blackout."

"Not to this extent." There was a muted rattle as House unscrewed the cap of his pill bottle. Or attempted to. "Patient was unconscious for upward of five minutes," he continued, still struggling with the stubborn object.

"It's still not entirely impossible," Cameron pointed out.

Foreman folded his arms across his chest. "How about we stick with what's actually plausible, then?"

"You might've noticed that the answer to our cases are not always considered plausible."

With a pop, the cap came off at last. House breathed a sigh of relief. "Why do the manufacturers keep insisting that I have children?" he demanded to no one in particular, tossing back a pill. His eyes shifted again to his team, which had fallen silent, Foreman and Cameron having ceased their sniping at his sudden pronouncement. "Not that I have any, you understand. Don't believe Cuddy's slanderous lies." He tossed the bottle onto his desk with a clatter. "Come on, guys, where's the diagnosis?"

"Hepatitis A," Foreman threw out. "It causes flu-like symptoms, fatigue, fever..."

"As well as abdominal pain and diarrhea," House said, unhooking his cane from where it hung on the whiteboard and beginning to roll it back and forth between the palms of his hands. "Too bad Michael here hasn't made poopie since he's been admitted four hours ago."

"His history's clear for it, anyway," Chase added. "Doesn't work in any food production or anything."

Foreman glanced at Chase. "Thought you said the patient's history isn't accurate."

Chase bristled.

"Leukemia," Cameron suggested before her colleague could start the cycle of argument all over again. "Early stage."

"No." Chase gave the file in front of him a slight poke with his pencil. "No significant bruises, nothing that amounts to more than walking into a table. Since he works in the gardens, his blood platelet levels have to be normal to avoid massive bleeding and bruising."

"Always could go back to the food poisoning," Foreman said. "Listeriosis results from bad food, and his immune system could be compromised enough from the flu virus going around for it to latch on."

House, having moved onto twirling his cane slowly in one hand as he studied the board, stopped his movements abruptly. He glanced off, eyebrows furrowing. "Gardens...are prime breeding grounds for ticks." He turned back to his team. "Which, in turn, carry a nasty little infection called Lyme disease. Flu-like symptoms, headache, fatigue, it's all there."

"Flu-like symptoms, but that doesn't necessarily include dehydration," Foreman said. "Lyme disease doesn't cause dehydration, which leaves the blackout unexplained."

"Dehydration could've come from anywhere," Chase replied. "Maybe he doesn't make a habit of drinking water. Coupled with the effects of Lyme disease, that could lead to unconsciousness."

"Wasn't there incense down there, too?" Cameron stirred her coffee thoughtfully without taking a drink. "Some people can't take that much incense. It could cause different effects in different people."

Foreman shook his head. "I still say listeriosis is far more likely."

"Stomach problems should be the first thing he complains about if he's got it," Chase replied.

"You know," Cameron interjected, "a blood test can be used to determine both."

"Ah, compromise at its finest." House, who had been watching the exchange with mild interest, gave an affirmative nod. "Draw some blood, run the serology, and check his skin again for an EM rash while you're at it, too."

Chairs scraped as all three of his staff filed quickly out the door. House didn't watch them go, instead lingering in front of the whiteboard for a few seconds longer, mind still running through his mental lexicon of infectious diseases as he studied the list of symptoms scrawled on its surface. The blackout was bothering him. Five minutes…dehydration…a basement shed…fungal allergy? No, the environmental factors didn't add up. Lyme disease and listeriosis could cause it, true, but not very often, and even then...

His hand reached for the remaining shot of whiskey, and he downed his final drink.

--o--

Ah, lunchtime.

Or rather, it would be lunchtime if Wilson had had a lunch, which wasn't stolen by the limping twerp that resided at this hospital.

Turning a corner, he stopped outside a pale green room with dimmed lighting and closely drawn curtains, set a ways back from the rest of the hallway. The silver tag on the door read Rm 1204. The coma patient's room. House's favorite hideout.

Wilson poked his head in without bothering to knock. "Did – " He stopped, gaze quickly shifting from the man reclining in a plastic hospital chair, eyes glued to the screen of Fox's latest soap opera, to the all-too-familiar Tupperware container sitting in said man's right hand.

It was empty.

"You stole my lunch?" Wilson tried for incredulity, he tried for anger, but in the end, all that came out was tired exasperation. He should've known House would find a way to get back at him for abandoning their confrontation with Cuddy.

"It was delicious." House licked the plastic spoon clean with a self-satisfied smirk on his face, much like a cat who'd just gotten into the cream. His eyes never left the television.

Wilson sighed. "Well, I'm glad you enjoyed it, at least."

"Not going to scold me for eating your chicken?" House raised an eyebrow questioningly. He had been expecting a snipped tongue-lashing, or at least some sort of verbal sparring, before the other resigned himself to the reality of the situation.

…Wilson definitely had something planned.

"Clearly, scolding is ineffective," the other replied with a wry glance at the now-empty container.

"So is hiding your food in the inner back pocket of the oncology lounge fridge, but you still do it."

"Well, I have to keep some optimism."

House finally chuckled and gestured to his side. "Coma patient left you some nice fruit and jello. Dig in."

"Right..." Wilson eyed the hospital-variety lunch with some distaste. He made no move to touch it. "Lovely. You know, it's really my secret plan to prevent you from maintaining a proper diet so that scurvy makes a comeback in America." Considering the amount of sugary snacks and peanut butter sandwiches House consumed on a daily basis, it was a wonder the man hadn't come down with it already.

"So _that's_ what you and Cuddy were conspiring while you had me locked up in the closet."

"It was a prime opportunity to discuss your eating habits." Wilson paused. "Although I do believe _you_ were the one who locked that door."

"You would believe wrong," House lied smoothly, never missing a beat. "Better get that memory checked, could be a symptom of Wernicke-Korsakoff syndrome."

It was Wilson's turn to look skeptical now. "Given our diets, I think you have a more appropriate background for WKS than I do."

"What, now you're a nutritionist? Gonna tell little Greggy he can't go outside to plaaayyy if he doesn't finish his broccoli?" the other mocked.

Wilson just rolled his eyes, not even bothering to dignify that with an answer. He pointedly changed the subject. "Actually, did you have anything planned for tonight?"

House stopped and slowly looked up. Blinked. James had that slightly shifty gleam in his eyes, the one that always gave him away in poker (hiding aces), the one that charmed him into the skirts of ladies (playing hooky), the one that practically screamed, "You know I'll have my way." His head tilted to one side, and he smiled.

Oh, this was going to get interesting.

"Other than falling asleep to the sweet, sweet melody of Russian porno?" House pretended to consider. "Nope."

The gleam got brighter. "Are you willing to do away with those sweet melodies for some real food? My treat."

House was about to make some comment about how smiling too innocently could cause permanent muscle damage to the face when he was rudely interrupted by a voice at the door.

"House. The lab results are back." Foreman stepped in from the hallway. "PCR test was inconclusive, but the ELISA and immunoblot showed definite signs of Lyme disease." He shrugged noncommittally. "Looks like you were right."

"Go forth, and commence the healing," House proclaimed with a grand wave of his cane, secure in the knowledge that once again, a patient was saved thanks to his genius. The end narrowly missed smacking Wilson in the arm.

"I'm…assuming that means you want us to start him on antibiotics." Foreman glanced dubiously at his boss. Insane. Definitely. The only question was for how long.

"By the power of Saint Jimmy, let his soul be – "

He was cut off by the slam of a door.

"Now, where were we again?" House turned back to his friend, who was looking decidedly less smug than before. Wilson wondered just how much of that bag of Vicodin the other had taken up till now. "Ah, right. You were just about to tell me your deepest, darkest secret." With a push of his cane, House hobbled up from his seat by the bed and toward the exit, stopping momentarily along the way to deposit his spoon into the trash can. He shoved the Tupperware container into Wilson's hand. And smirked.

"7 o'clock then, my place. Make sure to bring the chopsticks."

--o--

He was expecting Styrofoam. White, squeaky, planet-killing Styrofoam. Or cardboard. Paper bags. The delicious scent of Chinese. You know, all the usual ingredients that takeout food consisted of.

He was not, however, expecting –

"Groceries?" House blinked once, scanning Wilson up and down. "Have you forgotten the sacred gift that is delivery before nine?"

There was a crinkle as Wilson pushed one of the bags into his free hand. House took half a step back.

"I'm supporting the underdogs that are supermarkets," the other replied dryly, stepping through the doorway and heading directly for the kitchen.

"Yeah, those supermarkets," House remarked, eyeing his friend with some curiosity. Wilson had never been this enamored by cooking before. "Always getting oppressed by the massive _Panda Buffet_ campaign." He paused to push the apartment door shut with his cane (though didn't bother to lock it – his carefully cultivated reputation of doom had protected him this far, after all), arm precariously balanced, then made his way into the dining room.

Above him, the light bulb flickered once. House glanced up briefly at it as he set his bag on the countertop. Hm. The Energizer Filament was burning out. Better get that replaced soon, or else late-night gaming sessions would be a problem.

"I trust you don't buy Fair Trade coffee, then." More crinkling by his side signaled the dumping of an armful of...assorted…solid…objects onto the counter. House glanced at Wilson, who was busily ignoring him in favor of the various unidentifiable products that had spilled out of the bag (Raw ingredients? Uncooked? What was this travesty!), then started rifling through his own. Chicken, chicken wings, chicken tenders, chicken broth…bird flu was sure to make a comeback at this rate…and – what was this? Chocolate squares! Something intelligent, at last.

He broke off a piece and was about to drop it into his mouth when a hand swiped it out from between his fingers with lightning speed.

"_That_ is my main ingredient for chocolate raspberry cake," Wilson said, his tone bordering on exasperation. He stuffed the chocolate piece back into its aluminum wrap. "Can't you hold something without digging into it? I'd hate to see someone hand you a bomb."

House paused, raising an eyebrow. "Well," he began grandly, "not all your base are belong to us."

Wilson's forehead wrinkled slightly in confusion as he squinted at his friend. Was it…true? Yes, yes, it seemed the rumors were right. House actually _did_ turn into a lunatic at the advent of the full moon. After a few moments, he turned back to his groceries and began sorting through them again.

"Right..." he answered slowly, beginning to search the cupboards for whatever little edible ingredients might be stored within their depths. "And clearly, not all the English are used good by you." He turned to face House, one hand still resting on an open cupboard door. "Where's your sugar?"

"Why, you planning on spiking my Vicodin with it?"

Wilson only turned back to his rummaging. "Given the fact that I am actually doing you a favor by feeding you, maybe you could be a little more on the cooperative side?" He pulled open the refrigerator, one arm slung over the top of the door as he scanned the contents. Or…lack thereof. Bread, peanut butter, sandwich meat, more peanut butter, mustard, strawberry jam, an aging bottle of pickles, and…

House watched as Wilson's eyes traveled down to the center shelf.

"House, why is your _sugar_ in the fridge?"

He gave two innocent blinks. "I…ran out of space in my pantry?"

The only response was a shake of the head, one that spoke volumes of what Wilson thought of his friend's kitchen etiquette.

"You know, if you're going to be so uptight about my frozen sugar, we could cook all this over at your place instead," House pointed out. "I take it everyone's out tonight at the opera?" Fischman's family did have a taste for the elite, a taste quite glaringly reflected by his derisive snort every time he happened to pass by during House's soap opera hour. The man's blood was so blue, he could be a Smurf. It was a wonder Wilson decided to shack up with them after the –

House froze internally, his mind catching onto the ploy. So, _that_ was what the other had in mind….

"Well, and my stove broke down," Wilson replied after a split second of hesitation, too fast for someone not paying attention to catch. "The guy won't come fix it till after the weekend." He removed the bag of sugar and seemed about to shut the door when something caught his attention. His arm plunged into the depths of the fridge again and came out with a Tupperware container, which he gingerly set on the counter before turning to House with an incredulous look.

"You still have this? It's been weeks!" His gaze shifted back to the container with the kind of odd fascination one sees on the face of onlookers after a particularly gruesome car accident. "The contents are _fuzzy_."

House gave it a passing glance, his eyes lingering for a second or two on the note still stuck to its cover. He'd find a way to approach the subject later. It was too late now.

"I was researching the effects of arctic temperatures on mold," he proclaimed matter-of-factly. "Apparently, they do quite well given half the chance and a few week's growth." He paused, tilting his head. "Kind of like you."

Wilson lifted an eyebrow, privately chuckling at being compared to mold. "Will you be presenting your findings in a scientific journal?" he asked.

"Hopkins already offered me a book deal."

"Oh, good," Wilson said, his tone false-positive as he pulled open the cutlery drawer and removed a chopping knife. "Then you can pay me back the three hundred I loaned you two weeks ago."

"Three weeks ago," House corrected, pointing his cane in the other's direction. "And that debt was declared null and void after you lost the monthly poker tournament." He limped around the kitchen for a moment in an attempt to find something else to feed his sweet tooth, while Wilson hacked away at the naked chicken. Did chickens know how little dignity they had in death?

Then again, death was never dignified in the first place.

With boy wonder sufficiently distracted by his butchering, House decided now was the time to make his move. Sidling by the counter, he reached into the bag and snatched up the chocolate bar, biting into it quickly before Wilson could notice.

And grimaced.

"Bitter chocolate?" he demanded, reaching for the nearest glass of water to clear the taste out of his mouth. "What kind of an oxymoron is _that_?"

There was a clatter as Wilson dropped his knife onto the cutting board and seized the chocolate once more from House's hands. "Pure chocolate is bitter," he stated matter-of-factly, mild annoyance registering in his eyes. "The stuff in vending machines has sugar and milk and chemicals and more sugar all boiled into it. Now could you stop consuming my dessert ingredients like a black hole designed for food?"

"Only if you'll tell me what you're cooking."

A slight pause. "Brunswick stew."

House lifted a curious eyebrow, gaze flitting over the items both within the grocery bag and scattered across the kitchen counters. "That Southern?"

"It is," Wilson replied, turning back to his bird hacker and chopping board. "It was originally cooked with squirrel in the 1800's. I'm told the bushy tail made good garnish."

House gave a smirk. "I'll have to tell Cameron to forget about that PETA invite then."

"Well, I'm sure I won't be the only one left out," Wilson retorted, not turning to look back at him. Probably a good idea, given the sharp blade the other man was holding. Squirrels were bad enough; House didn't quite want his friend's left fingers added to the stew, as well. "I doubt she had an invite for you."

There were three loud knocks as House tapped his cane against the cupboard. "Hey, I'm a _great_ animal lover," he announced with an edge of mock-insult. "I watch _The Discovery Channel_ every day." He paused, glancing at the glowing green numbers on the microwave clock. "Speaking of which…" House began limping out towards where his state-of-the-art HD TV entertainment system made its home. "Hell's Kitchen comes on in five minutes. Can't miss it."

Grabbing the remote, he settled back onto the couch with a contented sigh, fingers drumming idly across the smooth, wooden surface of his familiar cane, balanced on his lap, as he flipped expertly through the channels.

Ah, kitchen military boot camp. Now this was a show Wilson could take some pointers from. House chuckled at the idea of little Jimmy replacing the British drill sergeant in cooking whites. Not likely in all this chaos. The delicious sizzling sound of pork mixed with a growing din of human confusion, as pots and pans and various other kitchen utensils clanged ever louder through the apartment. House couldn't even tell which were coming from the television speakers and which from his personal chef.

"Don't break the screen reaching for the food on there," Wilson called.

"I was just giving the participants some pointers!"

"On what?" the other asked. House didn't turn to look, but considering how much clearer Wilson's voice sounded, he suspected his friend had poked his head around the corner. "Using can openers?"

"And boiling water," House added, stabbing an index finger at the mute button. Commercials were on, and while they occasionally amused him, he wasn't quite prepared to listen to them yet. "It takes skills to heat it up just right." A moment's pause, during which a gorgeous young woman dramatically tossed her flowing, honey-brown locks into the camera. House ogled approvingly. "Which I'm sure you were doing when your stove broke," he went on.

"Actually, I find a water boiler works well," Wilson said.

"Only an obsessive-compulsive like you would spend forty dollars on a custom-made electronic device to boil _water_." If not for the trip awhile back in which he'd accompanied Wilson to look for a toaster, he wouldn't have even known that such a waste of steel, plastic, and energy existed.

A loud clatter was the immediate response to his remark, nearly cutting the end of his sentence off, and certainly interrupting the Master Chef who had just reappeared onscreen. House turned up the volume. "Is my hearing going, or are you SLAUGHTERING THINGS IN THERE?"

"Since when is wanting a more safe and efficient way to boil water a form of OCD?" Wilson shouted over the noise. "And in case you haven't ever witnessed a surgery, cutting into flesh does not in any way sound like metal on metal."

"Oh, but all my subjects happened to have bionic arms," House replied, lowering the volume. He didn't feel like yelling. "As for efficiency, you might want to look to your left. There, you will see what is known as the microwave. It is God's gift to the single male."

Though Wilson was only recently single, so perhaps he had yet to adjust to such gifts from above.

House glanced up as he heard approaching footsteps. Wilson was standing beside the desk lamp, arms crossed, watching him with a bemused look. No food in hand, though. Shame. It was probably almost done, seeing as how boy wonder had decided to stop obsessing over the kitchen for awhile.

"Maybe you should write them a letter about the microwave," Wilson suggested, joining House on the couch.

"Think they'd listen?" House asked, nodding at the television set. The remote control bounced from one hand to the other as he tossed it back and forth.

"Well, coming from such an esteemed connoisseur of Western cuisine, I'm _positive _Chef Ramsay would be just thrilled to garner your recommendations." The flying remote sufficiently distracted Wilson for about two seconds before he glanced back at the screen.

"Well, he'd have to like it," House said, nodding his head. "I mean, microwaves are made to cook. Don't the British like everything cooked until it falls apart?"

Wilson glanced dubiously at his friend. "Is that what you learned from Chase?"

House just snorted and turned his eyes back to the television. "From Chase, I learned that gender is not always so clear cut at times."

"Centrum Silver," announced an aged, but hearty voice. The screen panned across a happy, old couple biking down a forest path, as autumn leaves fluttered in the background. At the bottom, a multi-colored logo unfurled. "It's a great time to be silver."

House wrinkled his nose. "Jesus, who comes up with these lines? That's like saying the 1990's was a great time to have AIDS."

Wilson gave a half-amused snort and pushed himself off the couch – to get the food, House presumed. "People who get paid?" he tossed over his shoulder as he disappeared into the kitchen. After a few more rummaging noises and clanging, Wilson returned with a plate in each hand. "Bon appetit," he remarked dryly.

House dug in cautiously, as he did with all of Wilson's new recipes. He had to admit, it _smelled_ good, but there was really no telling. Any number of outlandish ingredients could've accompanied the chicken into the pot. "I expect I won't find any squirrel tails in this."

"Well, I would've added some, but PETA can get pretty extreme with people they don't like."

"So animal lives are more sacred than human lives?" House was digging in thoroughly by this point, expertly balancing the plate on his lap as he occasionally flipped channels with his non-utensil using hand.

"To them?" Wilson gave an affirmative nod. "Most likely."

"Hmm..." House mused aloud to himself. "I wonder if Ramsay ever gets heat from the vegan nuts for his cooking..."

"If people are sending him letters with culinary advice regarding his microwave, I'm sure protests aren't too extreme."

"Just you wait till hippie season starts."

"I wasn't aware hippies came in seasons." Wilson made a quizzical face.

"Oh, they do." House raised an eyebrow back, voice taking on a solemn tone. "Late summer's the mating season. You don't want to be around when that occurs. I doubt even the Iron Chef could stop them."

"Since when were you an Iron Chef expert?"

"Since I learned they had paid professions for people to eat food."

Wilson's fork scraped sharply across his plate. "What, it's not enough to eat my food for free?"

"I'd hardly call once several months a palatable arrangement." House smirked inwardly at his friend's barely veiled annoyance, and continued on. "You know…you could just get your own cooking show. Rare foods, great pay, an audience of hot, young women all _dying _to meet their favorite celebrity up close and in person." He waved one hand in a grandiose gesture. "They could call it, Purgatory's Cookhouse. The misadventures of Copper Chef and Devil Playboy."

"You want me to start my own cooking show?" Wilson's incredulity hung in the air for a few seconds, before he lapsed into the world of sardonic make-believe. "Yes…I could start one. A Mexican one. With various forms of stuffed peppers presented each week."

"Which will then be hastily swept aside in favor of the much more ratings-friendly macadamia pancake cookout."

"You have a worse sweet tooth than a five-year-old."

"And you prefer to eat steamed dung beetles." House poked a fork in the other's direction. "Who's insane now?"

Wilson shook his head exasperatedly. "What _do_ you have against peppers, anyway? You hate them like you do clinic patients."

"They're lethal." House considered. "Both of them." Returning the dubious look from his companion with a knowing one of his own, Greg leaned back against the sofa and began to twirl his cane thoughtfully, the beginnings of an old residency encounter creeping at the edges of his mind. "I had a patient come in once…Middle-aged, Caucasian male, drug user from one of the downtown clubs. He was wheeled into the ER screaming bloody murder as he tried madly to claw his face off." Abruptly, he drummed his cane against the floor. "Turns out the guy took some bad cocaine! But not just any bad cocaine, oh no, this was cocaine laced with the latest in drug-deterrent spices." House paused dramatically. "Capsaicin. Habareno pepper seeds."

"...He spent the latter half of his hospital visit learning to eat mush through a tube."

Wilson pulled back, not sure whether to be amused or perturbed by the other's outlandish tale. "Well, I can assure you that those are not the same as bell peppers. Bell peppers aren't even remotely spicy."

"How can you be sure someone won't switch them one day?"

"Because unlike a certain friend I know, I'm not involved in any major drug conspiracies that might warrant such militant retribution."

House returned the sarcasm twofold. "Yes, bitter, spited boyfriends always purchase their revenge material from leading Columbian dealers." He stopped, tilting his head in mock confusion. "Did I mention he was gay?"

The last line finally elicited a chuckle from Wilson, who was caught off-guard by the glib remark. "Are you saying I should be afraid I'll have a spited boyfriend someday?"

Greg cracked a rare smile back. "Only if you keep making stuffed pepper stew."

Their conversation ebbed into a comfortable silence, as Wilson focused most of his attentions on enjoying his hard-earned meal, while House flipped distractedly through the channels. Over a hundred of them, and not a single show worth mocking at the moment. Where were trashy soap operas when you needed them? Sighing, he finally relegated the TV to that purgatory of nighttime infotainment – the evening news – and went back to eating his stew.

After a few moments, he turned up the volume. Then back down. Frowned. Glanced at Wilson out of the corner of his eye. Now was probably the best time he was going to get. Still out of place, but at least he wasn't inserting anything off-topic in the middle of a conversation.

He was fairly certain Wilson being here had nothing to do with a broken stove. In fact, he was fairly certain Wilson being here had nothing to do with a stove at all.

"You know, most people go to a bar when they're avoiding marriage problems," he began finally, not bothering as usual to mince his words. "You, on the other hand, break your stove. In fact, not only do you break it in time for our meeting tonight, conveniently timed to coincide with the date your divorce papers are due, but you also manage to completely miss the utility service just a few blocks down the road from your house when you went to pick up the groceries." He flipped the television on mute and turned to level his full gaze at Wilson.

"You're living in a hotel again, aren't you?"

Wilson slowly set his fork down on the table. "What's that saying about 'assume' again? Something about an ass..." He glared pointedly at House, who steadfastly ignored the hint.

"Because as I recall," the other went on bluntly, knowing he'd hit the nail on the head now, "the last time this subject was brought up, _you_ said you'd found a place with Fischmann from oncology until the divorce settlement went through. But, since Fischmann's out of town at that lung cancer meeting in DC, and his wife would never allow a guest – let alone her husband's boss – to trouble himself with grocery shopping on a Friday night, that could only mean one thing. You don't have a stove." He paused, letting the point sink in. "You haven't had one for awhile. And judging by the way you've been avoiding your divorce lawyer all this time, it doesn't look like you'll be getting a new one until at least the end of November."

"Drop it, House," Wilson said sharply. "I came here for a nice evening away from it all, not for you to start lecturing me."

"No, if you had wanted a nice evening, you would've gone out to the A&B with Debby from accounting," House corrected. "You wouldn't be here cooking dinner for me. You don't come to me for distractions." No, Wilson came to him for favors. Personal favors. But then, he should've known from the moment James trotted out that charming little dinner invitation that there was more to the evening.

"I – " Wilson sighed and set his barely-touched food down on the table. "Fine. I was going to ask if I could move back in, alright?" He fiddled with his fork to avoid looking the other in the eye.

House raised an eyebrow. "And what changed your mind? Other than my fully functioning stove, that is."

There was a slight hesitation. "They don't know your address," Wilson finally admitted.

So. The truth was out.

Somehow, House wasn't surprised. The long hours, the late lunches, the sudden, urgent conferences that always seemed to crop up during the middle of the day…it all added up to classic marital avoidance behavior on the part of James H. Wilson. You had to wonder whether the guy kept his own Kubler-Ross poster in his office. House decided to find out.

"And my phone? Did you have that tapped too?"

There was another hesitation before Wilson frowned and shook his head dismissively. "Can I move in or not?"

_Oh, James. Still refusing to acknowledge stage 2 anger, are we?_

House tilted his head in contemplation, as his cane tapped rhythmically against the floor. "You know, one month ago, I couldn't even beg you to say those words. Now, it's like poker night with the closeted girlfriend never happened." He ceased his tapping suddenly. "Make the call, and I'll even throw in a free hairdryer. Noisy as you like."

"I was looking more for a yes or no answer."

"Then you'd better start looking for another apartment."

Wilson gave an exasperated sigh. "You know – " He waved his fork almost violently in House's direction " – you say you hate it when people interfere in your personal business. So why are you turning around and _blackmailing_ me into calling my lawyer?" He leaned forward. "Not everything is a case for you to fix, House. Let it go."

"Funny you should mention blackmail," House replied, pushing himself off the couch into a better lecturing position. "Because I hear a certain oncologist is _really_ good at that when it serves his needs." He leaned on his cane with both hands, facing Wilson, who hadn't looked that pissed off since House had bashed his cancer patient from the autopsy several months ago. "You're not here because you want to lie low for a couple of days, you're here because you want to avoid dealing with it altogether. Sure, that'll work out the first few weeks; you'll screen your calls, take a cab, leave through the backdoor at odd hours of the morning..." He shrugged, indicating that the list was endless. "But then, one day, those guys down at the district court are going to get serious, and the next time you walk into work, it's not going to be an angry message on your voice mail anymore. It's going to be a magistrate at your door demanding the divorce papers right now, while the rest of the hospital watches."

Wilson scowled, dropping his fork onto his plate with a clatter that echoed through the apartment. "Do you think you're doing me a favor here? Because you're not." He threw up his hands. "You just can't let _anything_ drop, can you? Though I suppose shouldn't be surprised, given how long you've clung to Stacy."

House blinked momentarily, not expecting the comment about Stacy (though he wasn't sure why; it was certainly something he would've said). "Oh, now we're getting somewhere," he remarked scathingly. "Shooting the messenger for delivering the death knell. Remind me again, but what does hypocrisy stand for?"

Wilson got to his feet at last, shutting off the television as he did. "You're incredible. Now you're calling _me_ a hypocrite after being one yourself?"

"The trade does have its side benefits," House replied, beginning to pace around Wilson. He dug out his bottle of Vicodin and tossed a pill into his mouth. A good thing he'd stocked up earlier.

"It's not a _trade_," Wilson began, clearly beyond irritated by now. "A trade involves actually exchanging something for another. You, on the other hand, are still a hypocrite—

"Spoken like a true man of his word," the other broke in sarcastically.

" – and in being so, you have no right to fling that title back at me," Wilson went on, his voice rising significantly. "In fact, now that I think about it, this really makes you a double hypocrite, doesn't it? Congratulations, you may have invented a new term."

"I'll notify Webster immediately." He took a step forward, meeting Wilson's livid glare with one of his own. "You want to yell at me, _fine_. Go ahead. But don't expect me to play your defense in some cat-and-mouse game between the authorities and Jimmy's Guilty Conscience (TM). Because when it comes down to idiotic maneuvers in the name of love," House scoffed, "conscience always wins."

"I wasn't looking for defense. I was looking for support. Maybe next time, I'll find a friend who's a little more interested in that area."

"Maybe next time, you'll find a girlfriend who's not a walking body bag," House shot back instantly without thinking.

The other's expression darkened immediately. "You're an ass." Plates violently knocked together with a clang as Wilson snatched them up and stormed past House, nearly bowling the latter over. From the kitchen came the spray of tap water turned on full blast.

House stood there for a moment, contemplating.

_Annnnd we have stage 2. Houston, I repeat, we have stage 2 anger._

Except what he had been hoping for was more along the lines of stage 3 – bargaining – so he could finally get Wilson to admit to the Julia problem and get her off _his_ tail, seeing as how she'd phoned five times now in the last two weeks, all during his nightly OC marathon. House sighed inwardly. Time for some more patient probing. He couldn't very well let Wilson leave still immensely angry anyway, because then it would carry on the next day to the office, where Cameron would invariably notice and Cameron would push and then House would have to somehow get her to unlatch herself, which was about as appealing a chore as getting one's prostate checked. Without anesthetic.

He paused outside the kitchen entrance, cane tapping idly in one palm. "She called two days ago, you know," he said finally, just loud enough to be heard over the running water. "Julia did. Said she...wanted to finish this thing quickly. Let the both of you move on." He hesitated, eyeing Wilson to see if he could gauge a reaction from the other's back.

"...I told her you were gone at a conference till the end of this month."

Wilson stopped trying to scrub the whiteness off the plates at last, watched emptily as the water pounded down the kitchen sink. Swirling. Bubbling. Draining into oblivion. With a snap, he shut off the taps and turned around to face the entrance, tension still coiled in his arms. House…apologizing. It was obvious House was apologizing. In his own way, anyhow. Wilson could recall roughly five times House actually uttered the word "sorry" with genuine intent.

He fixed the other with a silent gaze, and tried to steel the bitterness in his voice.

"Hou – "

Abruptly, a shrill ring cut through his reply. House blinked, but made no move to respond, letting the phone continue to protest as he held Wilson's gaze for a few seconds longer. His hand on the cane grip tightened.

_If this is her call…surely we…_

Another ring. House finally dug out his cell phone, answering it with a curt, "Yes?" By the way the other's expression darkened immediately, it only took a moment for Wilson to realize that this was hospital business. Bad hospital business.

"I'll be there." House closed the cell slowly, eyes still fixed on some point beyond the linoleum floor. Finally, he lifted his gaze.

"Patient just went into respiratory arrest."


	5. Chapter 4

**Title:** Pathology  
**Rating:** PG for mild language  
**Pairing:** House/Wilson  
**Description:** House must once again race against time to save a patient, while dealing with the aftermath of his bitter argument with Wilson.  
**Author's Note:** After this, I swear I'm never writing medical mysteries again. All information was gotten off of Google and various other websites, so if anything's inaccurate...honestly, I don't have the energy to pursue it any further. Just pretend all those big words actually mean what they're supposed to mean. Once again, thank you melanthev for the meticulous research you've done in writing the chapter with me. Anyone who's interested in the drinking game side story that follows this chapter should check out Misery Loves Company, which I published as a stand-alone fic. It can be found in my profile.

"New symptom." House finished scrawling the words on his whiteboard and turned, tapping his pen. "Respiratory arrest. What does this tell us?"

Foreman replied slowly, as though stating the obvious. "That...it could be any number of respiratory conditions."

"Flu-like symptoms rule out a lot on that list, though," Cameron was quick to add.

"Could still be plenty." Foreman shrugged. "Leptospirosis, for one. Patient works in the gardens, he could've picked it up from the soil."

Cameron shook her head. "Place has no pets, and given that he works for an extremely rich woman at a very large mansion, I doubt there's rat urine just lying around." She flipped through the patient history with a practiced eye, pen poised to jot down notes. "It says here the grounds are fenced in, too."

"Okay. Let me rephrase that," House cut in with mocking indulgence. "What new information _not_ previously stated in the differential diagnosis or otherwise identifiable by a first year med student – " Abruptly, his cane came flying down to slam squarely onto the heavy, leatherbound red textbook in the center of the table. " – with a Merck Manual does this tell us?"

He was greeted by unanimous silence.

Perfect. At this rate, they should come up with the correct diagnosis sometime within the next century.

"Come on, people!" House barked, impatience finally getting the better of him. "Respiratory distress, blackouts, and the flu. What do they all have in – "

"I still say TB," Chase broke in. "It fits everything – respiratory failure, fever, fatigue, the only thing we're missing is the risk factor."

"Which almost automatically rules it out," Foreman retorted, annoyed.

"He's got a history of cancer in the family," Cameron suggested helpfully, trying to steer the conversation away from three angry men snapping at each other's throats. "Says here his mother died of leukemia five years ago." She glanced over at Wilson in the corner.

But the other man shook his head. "If you're thinking of Hodgkin's, that's not it. His lymph nodes are swollen, but they're tender, not painless." His eyes shifted distractedly out the window, then back again. "The symptoms don't match."

The room lapsed once more into silence.  
"You're all missing something." House tapped his cane thoughtfully, head tilted toward the tabletop, where several patient folders were scattered in disarray. His staff waited expectantly for the moment of brilliance. "The CBC. Foreman, what did his white count show?"

"Dramatic increase would suggest a bacterial infection." Foreman sighed, realizing where this was going.

"And what common bacteria do we know of that causes fever, drowsiness, and really, really difficult breathing?"

"...Histoplasmosis?" Chase suggested hesitantly. "The disseminated form could resemble TB. He's got fever, chest pains, ARDS with the respiratory failure." Leaning in, he rapped the test results with his pencil. "Explains the white count, too."

"I was actually thinking...bacterial pneumonia." House furrowed his brow in a semi-quizzical gaze. "But that works too. Get me a chest x-ray, CT scan, arterial blood gas, and check his lymph nodes again while you're at it. Better safe than relying on Dr. Wilson's _pain_ – " He made sure to emphasize the last word with a glance at the corner. " – sensibilities."

Cameron blinked, frowning slightly as she looked from her boss to Wilson and back. Those two looked like they'd just been through the meat grinder together. Although she'd only been working at Princeton Plainsboro for about a year till now, she had quickly picked up on the odd sort of friendship House shared with the amiable oncology head. The two worked together, ate together, even lived together for a time, or so she heard (Chase seemed to find that last one especially amusing). Given everything Cameron knew about her boss, and the fact that Dr. Wilson had managed to stay around him for almost ten times the length of her fellowship, House must've really pushed things over the deep end to bring their relationship to this level.

Not that she, of all people, should be surprised.

Shrugging inwardly, Cameron gathered her papers and filed out with the rest of her colleagues, leaving the room empty but for the two men.

Wilson stood up in silence. "Well, since I'm no longer needed here..." He trailed off, turning slowly to follow the others out the door.

"Going home?" House's voice held a tone of idle curiosity, which only a person experienced in parsing such things could tell was actually a mask for keen intrigue.

Wilson paused at the entrance, one hand above the knob. Deliberately, he ignored the question. "Page me when you're done. Your place is on the way to the hotel."

The door swung shut, cold as ice. 

--o--

Chase made his way down to the patient rooms briskly, hands shoved in pockets as he mused idly on the case. It seemed pretty open-and-shut so far, despite the respiratory incident, and House had probably already figured out the case several steps in front of them. His boss did that often, withholding information from his staff that he might have deduced privately during the differential diagnosis. Supposedly, it was to train them in their diagnostics fellowship. Chase thought it more likely that House did it just to seem superior.

Turning a corner, he arrived at the patient room and opened the door. Immediately, a dark-haired man whirled to address him.

"Are you Dr. House?" he demanded.

Chase closed the door slowly behind him. "No, I'm Dr. Chase."

"Well, where is he then?" the other man asked angrily.

Ah, and here came the fun part. Making excuses up for his boss. By the looks of things, Chase doubted anything short of imminent death would pacify this parent, but he gave it a try anyway. "Dr. House is…very busy. He's got a lot of difficult cases to deal with at the moment." Difficult cases involving missed soap operas and skipped clinic duty, if the last year had been any indication.

The father certainly wasn't buying it. "He hasn't been in to see my son _once_ since they admitted him yesterday," he said as he paced around agitatedly. "What the hell am I paying this hospital for?"

"Mark, please." The lady by the bedside finally spoke up. She looked too different to be a relative, fur coat and expensive diamond earrings belying her high social status, which clearly rested in some sort of old money inheritance. Oil, most likely. "Can you tell us what's wrong with him, doctor?"

"Right now, the most likely candidate is bacterial pneumonia."

"What do you mean, most likely?" Angry parent was quick to catch onto rhetorical details. Chase guessed he must be a lawyer.

"There are some symptoms that may point to another disease, but we can't know for sure at this point. The best thing to do is to allow us to run our tests and narrow down the options as quickly as possible." And if that weren't clear enough… "The faster we figure out what's wrong, the faster your son gets better."

The other man stood in silence for a few moments, then finally turned and muttered angrily beneath his breath, "This is all because of your…Devil-worshipping DND games."

"Dad – "

Chase cut the argument off before it could heat up again. "We're going to need to do a CT scan," he said pointedly to the father. "The room is downstairs."

He made greater haste than usual getting the patient into a wheelchair and out the door.

Several feet safely down the hall, Michael turned and regarded him with an apologetic smile. "Sorry about my dad. He's been this way ever since mom died."

"Don't worry. I never got along with my father when I was your age either."

"Do you get along with him now?"

Chase paused, his mind flashing back to the tight, awkward good-bye that would be the last time he'd ever see his father alive again. Two months later, a phone call from home would nearly cost him his job, kill an innocent woman, and reveal exactly what level of lies the old man had been holding over his head all this time. Even in death, his father still managed to screw up his life.

"…We don't fight anymore," Chase answered shortly. Which was true, though perhaps not entirely complete.

They rode the elevator down in silence.

"So who was that lady in the room with you?" he asked after several seconds of uninterrupted walking.

"Oh, you mean Ms. Laudenbaum?" The kid perked up a bit. "She lives in our neighborhood. She's got a lot of money from an inheritance of hers, and spends most of it on plants for her home. I take care of her garden," he added offhandedly.

"You two seem close," Chase observed.

"Yeah, well…" Michael shrugged. "I started working for her freshman year. She owns a big mansion up in the hills, and sometimes, she lets me and the guys play DND there in the back. Her basement has awesome acoustics." For a moment, his eyes gleamed with all the joy of childish glee. Then, they softened and fell slowly to the ground. "I guess…since my mom died, it's been like a second home."

The CT room was empty when they arrived, having been booked for afternoon testing by the diagnostics staff (though not without a little strong-arming thanks to House's reputation among the nurses – but then, that was what Dr. Wilson was for). Stopping in front of the scanner, Chase began to make preparations for the exam as he explained the procedure.

"We're going to take a picture of your chest with this machine, so we can get a better look at your lungs."

"Like an X-ray?"

"Yeah, but much, much clearer." He indicated the table beside the hollow, cylindrical machine. "I need you to lie down and hold still for me, alright? This should only take a few minutes."

After making sure that Michael was properly aligned, Chase retreated to the control room where he began running the procedure. It was standard fare in the line of tests, stuff he'd been doing for years before this. Back when he was the only fellow working under House (his predecessor having quickly cracked beneath the man's virulent sarcasm – the Irish were, if possible, an even easier target for unceasing mockery), all the history-taking, treatment-noting, and general errand-boy-running fell to him. Which…wasn't so bad, considering they took about a case a week.

He'd seen how intensivists got treated at regular fellowships.

--o--

"...We are not the same people that we were a year ago," the blonde announced significantly, as though she had just spoken the true meaning of life. "We've been fighting to hang on to something..."

"Yeah, we have."

"And?"

"Maybe we shouldn't anym – "

"The tests came in." Chase's words abruptly interrupted soap reality. House tried vainly to ignore his subordinate's voice.

"CF was negative for histoplasmosis, and his blood sodium levels are normal. We didn't see any evidence of—"

"Shh." House waved a hand in that universal shut-up-now gesture.

Chase stopped mid-sentence, shocked, if not a little irritated, at being shushed by his employer. House gave him a meaningful glance. "Commercial's on in five minutes."

Foreman sighed and exchanged an exasperated look with his other two colleagues. This was just like House, always setting his priorities straight. Soap opera romances came before dying children. While they all ran around and tried to keep the patient's family happy, their boss was busy catching up on his TiVo list with _The Young and the Restless_ over lunch.

Cameron opened her mouth to interject a comment, but Foreman beat her to it.

"We didn't see any evidence of pneumonia, either," he proclaimed loudly over the television. "X-rays show no sign of consolidation."

"Did you check the CT? Because I hear the CT is really great for getting at all those blind spots." House was stalling. Three more minutes. Just three more minutes until Nick finally confessed to Sharon. He licked his yogurt spoon absently as his fingers fiddled with the volume control.

"Could you maybe turn that down?" Chase asked, annoyed.

"We checked." It was Cameron who finally stepped in front of the television and switched it off. "There were mass lesions and an absence of pleural effusions. No bronchial narrowing or artery obstruction." She placed her hands on her hips. "It's not histoplasmosis."

House raised a noncommittal eyebrow. "Any new symptoms?"

"No." Chase shook his head. "He's still got the fever, the chills, the headaches, and of course, the cough, which is getting worse."

None of this seemed to bother House, who gave the list some moments of thought, then raised his head. "...Okay. Put him on broad-spectrum antibiotics, and send a sputum culture to the lab." He snatched the remote back from Cameron, saying pointedly, "_Don't_ interrupt my soap."

"The kid doesn't have _time_ to wait out a culture that might not reveal anything useful," Foreman objected angrily. The way his boss acted, it was like they could play chemistry set with the kid's lungs for weeks on end. "His O2 stats are dropping, he won't last for another two da – "

"If it's an infection, the antibiotics will cure him. If it's environmental, just staying here will fix him. Anything else..." House shrugged as if all of this was obvious. "And we get a new symptom to play with."

"Now, are we done here, or do I have to get out my headphones?"

--o--

"A sputum culture?" Foreman demanded, walking briskly beside Chase as they headed toward the patient's room. Cameron had left for the cafeteria, as only one person was required to collect a sample. Foreman was following along for entirely different reasons.

"That's forty-eight hours _minimum_ for any results to appear," he continued. "Longer if we're dealing with a fungus."

"I think House is aware of that," Chase replied, hands in his pockets as he walked. The pair split in opposite directions momentarily to steer around a nurse pushing an elderly patient in a wheelchair before meeting up again on the other side.

"The kid could be dead by then," Foreman said, gesturing emphatically with one hand.

"I think House is _also_ aware of that." Chase sighed as he caught a look from his colleague. "Yeah, okay," he said, turning to face Foreman. "The kid could be dead. _Or_ he could just be dying still and we'd have a culture to look at."

Foreman gave an impatient huff. "You know perfectly well House isn't going to sit around waiting for bacteria to spring up. That is, if any even does. With the antibiotics we've been giving him, there's a good chance we'll get nothing."

Chase turned a left corner, shaking his head. "We're not doing a brain biopsy. We're getting the patient to cough a few times and then sending the samples up to the lab. It'll take five minutes. What's it matter if it's potentially useless?" He glanced at Foreman. "You're just arguing against House on principle. Weakly, at that."

Foreman rolled his eyes. "I'm just saying —"

Chase paused outside the patient room. "I know what you're saying. So go tell House, then." He thrust his arm in the general direction of their boss's office. "Or Dr. Cuddy. Pretty effective the last time you did that," he added dryly.

Foreman raised an eyebrow, not at all insulted. "Hey, my tattling only temporarily cost him the case, and I did it to save a patient. Yours, on the other hand, nearly cost him his job permanently, and Cameron's. And Dr. Wilson's."

Chase's expression darkened. He shifted his gaze, both irritated and uncomfortable about having the Vogler incident brought up. He was extremely lucky House hadn't fired him, really. One upside to working for a complete cynic was that House was never surprised at how far people would go to save themselves, and he never took it personally. A good thing too, since in the end, Chase had to admit he'd do the same if it happened all over again. Self-preservation was what got him through the years his father abandoned their family. Leave the sacrifice to Cameron.

Chase put his hand on the door handle, looking straight at Foreman in slight exasperation. "I'm collecting the sample." He slid open the entrance and stepped inside.

Foreman hesitated for a few moments before deciding he was probably better off joining Chase with the patient than catching up with Cameron in the lunch line. He followed resignedly and shut the door behind him. Chase was already holding out a standard four-ounce container in front of the patient.

"Aim and cough," he said. "Deep as you can. We're going to see what grows on the fluid you give us. Should tell us what's wrong with you."

Michael took the plastic container, appearing mildly interested even in his weakened state. "Like...mold? My eighth-grade biology teacher made us stick slices of bread in Ziploc bags. My dad thought it was a waste of food."

Chase smiled a little. "Well, fortunately, we're not using food this time."

Michael hesitated, unsure of exactly how he was supposed to cough in such a situation. After a few moments, he hacked.

Chase took the sample and peered into it. Too much spittle. "No good." He grabbed another container. "Could you try again?"

Foreman leaned against the glass door with his arms crossed, watching the patient cough deeply for roughly another three minutes before Chase was finally satisfied. The Australian doctor set the sample aside.

"Good. We'll get back to you when it's ready."

"Okay." Michael cleared his throat, moving slowly to adjust the pillows beneath his head. "You know, hospital beds suck as much as the food. My neck hurts from laying here."

Chase paused. "It's probably just from the sampling we did, all that coughing must've jolted a few muscles."

"Oh." Michael squinted and turned to face the two doctors, not moving his head, but his entire body. "Wait, where's my dad? Wasn't he here just a few minutes ago?"

Chase exchanged a slightly baffled look with Foreman. "No, your father left about an hour ago..."

"But he said he'd leave at ten-thirty."

Chase glanced at his watch. "Michael, it's eleven-thirty right now." He shot a look at Foreman. This was appearing to be a neurological problem, after all.

Foreman only looked back. "New symptom. Guess House was right."

--o--

A pretty brunette was showering behind foggy glass on screen, but no sound came from the television. House had flicked it on mute about ten minutes ago, opting to think in silence while he paced back and forth inside his office. A white yo-yo with a simple black swirl design on the side bounced up and down rhythmically.

Tests were still running in the lab. No new symptom from the kid. The flu...but not the flu. Or a really, really _nasty_ version of the flu. A super bug.

He tilted his head, contemplating that option, but discarded it quickly. This was an isolated case. He would've heard about something already if it were an epidemic that something such as a super bug would no doubt lead to. And so far, the news had only mentioned a really bad flu season. No deaths from the flu. Nothing from other hospitals, either, aside from your usual immunocompromised patients and the elderly. No, this was something else...

House slowed his yo-yoing as he caught sight of Wilson glancing briefly in the direction of his open office door. The oncologist hadn't really seemed like he was about to step in (Wilson always did have a thing with avoiding confrontation), but there was a definite look in that direction.

"Stopping by?" House called, eyes not moving from the spinning yo-yo.

Wilson, knowing he was caught now, made as though he were heading for House's office all along. There was a moment's hesitation as he struggled to find something to say.

"I was attracted to your yo-yo prowess," he said finally, deciding to fall back into the old bantering routine of theirs. The words came out with a stiffer undertone than intended, something that House didn't miss, but chose to ignore for the moment.

"It's a gift. I can spank the baby like no man can." House demonstrated said spanking. The yo-yo snapped up directly into his palm.

Wilson edged slightly to the side in case House didn't quite live up to his reputation. "I'd clap, but my hands are full." He waved his coffee mug as proof before stepping up to the desk, and cleared his throat. "How is your...patient?" When in doubt, steer the conversation towards business.

"Stable." House sat down in his chair and dropped the yo-yo onto his desk with a clatter, expression darkening. "They took him off the ventilator." He stared off thoughtfully into space. His index finger remained on the yo-yo's side, twirling it on the desk. "What type of cancer...would induce ARDS, but cause painful lymph nodes?"

Wilson set his coffee mug down. "None," he replied flatly. "Unless you're in the late stages, which your patient clearly isn't." Although...there was the one case where a woman was misdiagnosed... "Or," he went on, "unless the lymph nodes are painful due to non-cancerous factor."

House nodded his head, considering. "Like the flu, which, given the size of the waiting room lobby, our patient most likely has."

Wilson nodded as well, almost curtly. "Right." Silence descended once more. House kept on spinning his yo-yo, the plastic making a constant scratching sound against the wooden surface that eventually faded into white noise. Wilson studied the cream swirl in his half-empty coffee mug. Matisse, it was. Very vogue. The outer edge looked almost like a spiraling vortex.

After another few awkward moments, he picked the cup up in his hand and turned to leave.

"...You're mad at me," House stated suddenly, his tone matter-of-fact.

Wilson paused in his tracks, and turned around slowly. He wasn't sure if he was mad or if it had already faded into the aftershock awkwardness that always followed these ugly affairs. Certainly, he'd gotten into enough yelling matches with Julie to know all the steps that came after an initial explosion. Making up was almost an ancient ritual between him and House.

"You could say that," Wilson replied finally, taking a tentative step away from the door. Not that he wasn't entirely without fault either. It was true that House's callousness had pissed him off, but after about twenty years

_("does it occur to you that if you need that kind of a friend, you may have made some deeper errors?")_

he really should've known better than to expect much else.

House had taken to turning the yo-yo over in his hands, not looking at his friend. He hesitated, uncertain if now was the best time to bring up Julie again—but his need to pry got the better of him.

"The call with Julie didn't go over very well," he said. One eye shifted up to regard Wilson, trying to determine if any backfire was going to occur. From the way the other only pulled out a chair and sat down wearily, House decided he was in the clear for now.

"No," Wilson admitted, recalling the short conversation. If one could call it a conversation. "Not that I'm surprised."

"She bring up the house?" The yo-yo flew into the air and then came back down neatly into House's palm.

"Actually, she did. She asked me when I would come over to pack the rest of my things, so that she can leave." It didn't escape Wilson that he was starting to pick up the same cynical undertone that was a trademark of House.

The other man raised an eyebrow. "She's moving out?"

Wilson frowned. "No. I'm moving out. She's just moving out temporarily while I'm over there gathering what's left of my possessions." He'd stuffed another two suitcases when first going to the Fischmanns' and then his current hotel, but there were still a few remnants. A tie here and there, a few medical texts.

"Heh." House chuckled wryly. "From telephone tag to apartment swapping. I can see mediation's going real well."

Wilson opened his mouth to reply, only to be cut off by the familiar beeping of a pager. He automatically set down his coffee mug and started to check his, but stopped when House stood up and made his way to the door, indicating that it was his emergency.

"What's wrong?" Wilson asked.

House paused at the doorway and turned back around, eyes squinting sarcastically. "You're not communicating enough."

Wilson blinked in confusion as House disappeared around the corner, only sitting back in his chair when he realized the other man had been referring back to the earlier mediation comment.

--o--

"He's got meningitis."

House wrinkled his eyes. "Yeah, I figured that out from the memo."

"Headache, confusion, and progressive neck stiffness," Foreman continued as if his boss hadn't said a word. "It's the classic trifecta."

"Could be a complication from the lung inflammation," Cameron suggested.

"Or it could be a sign of the underlying condition," Chase was quick to add on. "Adenoviruses have been known to cause meningitis, and it would account for the respiratory symptoms as well."

"Adenoviruses don't progress this quickly."

Chase shot Foreman an irritated glance. "You've got a better idea?"

"Pneumococcal is much more likely given his current symptoms. The pneumonia led to the respiratory problems, which then progressed to the inflammation." Foreman laid it all out in a matter-of-fact tone, like it was a one-way road map.

"CT already ruled out pneumonia." Cameron shook her head. The symptoms weren't matching up, and her two colleagues still hadn't considered one other option. "This could all be…a totally separate illness, something he developed while he was here. Meningoencephalitis," she threw out.

"You think he has two rare conditions at the same time?" Foreman asked skeptically.

"Only one way to find out." Ever the peacemaker, House broke in before the argument could get any more heated. "Put him on ceftriaxome and vancomycin in case it's bacterial." He gave Foreman a pointed look. "It's lumbar puncture time."

"Where are you going?" Cameron asked quizzically after her boss's retreating back. House was definitely not heading toward the direction of his office, or his lounge, or the empty exam room where he occasionally caught a snooze when Dr. Cuddy wasn't watching. In fact, he almost looked like he was actually going to speak voluntarily with another human being.

"To find out if our patient has been anywhere he shouldn't." House turned, and called toward three teenage boys sitting outside in the waiting area, "Hey! Which one of you's been sleeping with your boyfriend?"

They stared back at him blankly.

"Obviously not STD's," House whispered confidentially to his staff.

The three just shook their heads and left.

"So…" Limping forward, House waved his cane at the three cloak-clad figures on the sofa. "No cure spell for blackouts? I thought they had a cleric in these games."

"Paul refused to play one," a serious-looking boy sporting blond hair and a smattering of freckles responded testily, as he pushed his coke bottle glasses up his nose.

"Right, because you couldn't decide whether to give a +2 or a +3 bonus in third edition." The other boy, whom House assumed was Paul, turned and fixed the diagnostician with a grave gaze. "Look, doctor…" He searched the man's jacket for a nametag, but found none.

"Foreman," House supplied helpfully.

"Doctor Foreman." Paul tried for a smile. "We already told the nurses what happened before. Mike was the first person to take a drink from the chalice, and after about five minutes, said he was feeling dizzy and collapsed. He asked for water right before he passed out."

"The dizziness started before he drank the concoction." Quiet till now, the boy with the mop of shaggy hair (it looked somewhat like Chase's after that unfortunate encounter with the switched shampoo bottle – totally not House's fault, of course) finally opened his mouth to back up his comrades.

House waited several minutes for him to elaborate, but was only met with awkward silence. "What was…_in_ the concoction?" he prodded impatiently. The three boys hesitated and glanced at each other. "Or is that a trade secret among you grim reapers?"

At last, Ben spoke. "Just some water, cinnamon, grape juice, and – "

"What? That's not kosher!" John cut in shrilly, as if he'd just been informed he'd eaten his baby's placenta and joined the Church of Scientology. The irony that he had been leading a chant for the Devil only an hour ago completely flew over his head.

"Somehow…I doubt the blood of a thousand virgins is either," House remarked sarcastically, earning a blank look from the other boy. He asked again, sharply, "What else was in the chalice?"

"A few herbs from this Korean drugstore we go to." Ben stopped, then added on quickly, "But the guy said it was totally safe, and we've been buying from him for months."

Ah, and therein lay their mistake. Trusting the guy who chopped up ginseng at the corner market in matters of public health. House was pretty sure there hadn't been a sane Korean since Kim Jong-Il took power. "Yeah. Next time, you might want to get a warranty." He shoved a pen in Ben's direction. "Give me the address."

"Does that mean we're sick too?" John piped up worriedly. "I mean, Mike's one of us and all, but he doesn't do the DND thing as much as we do. He's always hanging around Laudenbaum's place."

House paused, intrigued. "Gardening?"

Freckle face rolled his eyes. "Hardly. She has him working on all kinds of stuff in the house now. Took him out on a trip somewhere for two weeks over the summer, and neither of them ever talked about it afterward." He leaned over to whisper confidentially, "They were probably buying drugs."

House nodded slowly, in that way most people reserved for the very old or very stupid, but then stopped as his gaze wandered over to the patient windows. A glimmer of an idea tugged at the back of his mind.

"Or…doing something else illicit."

--o--

Wilson hurried along quickly, head down, arms stiff, eyes focused on the hard paneled wood beneath his shoes. The normally neat bangs brushed ragged across his face, falling lower and lower from their initial position atop his forehead until they nearly swept all the way down his nose. One strand in particular bobbed irritably over his eye.

Shaking his hair aside, Wilson turned a corner and spotted the last person he wanted to see at the moment standing in the middle of the hallway, spinning an old, oak cane thoughtfully in one hand. House looked like he was contemplating the meaning of life there beneath the fluorescent lights, eyes turned upward to the ceiling, which probably meant he had found another piece of his medical puzzle that wouldn't quite fit into the logical scheme of things, except for the possibility of some human error to detract from the exact science. Human in the form of a wayward patient. Suspected lies or cynicism, most likely. The stubborn jerk could never let those things go.

Having already sat through copious amounts of both in the last few hours (several phone calls from a man with a very precise, very polite, and very curt tone of voice), Wilson was in no mood to deal with yet another dance of constant aggravation. He opted for duck and run.

House, however, moved quicker. His cane shot out to hook over Wilson's arm, forcing the oncologist to stop abruptly and turn, hand thrown out to catch his balance.

"Visiting a patient?" House asked before Wilson could protest.

"What? No, I was just...with one." Only when he finished did Wilson realize his slipup. _Crap._

House gave him a knowing, you-can't-fool-me smile. "You're walking toward your office."

"I'm…putting this away." Wilson waved the blue folder in his hand to indicate exactly what it was he was putting away, as well as buy himself more time to make up an excuse. "I thought I needed something out of it, but I decided that maybe…working out a combination of meds for another patient would be better. Sara's actually doing alright at the moment."

"Hmm. Well." House pretended to reflect on this seriously. "Considering Sara_lee's_ in stage three liver cancer, that combination must be quite an accomplishment." He ignored Wilson's surprise, nodding at the file in the other's hand instead. "You only use the blue folder for terminal cases."

Wilson reluctantly glanced down at the folder he was holding.

"Hard to keep the colors straight, I know," House continued. "Blue is green, green is blue, red is magenta salmon pink..."

"I've got a lot of bad cases right now, that's all. Unlike you, I do get a lot more than one patient per week." Wilson gave his friend a pointed look and irritably shook his arm free of the cane.

"Somebody's moody." House sounded interested.

"I'm not moody, I'm just—"

"Distracted. With your heavy caseload." House nodded. "Got the memo." He tilted his head, gazing at Wilson out of the corner of his eye, like a child sneaking a shameful peek at the parents after committing some sort of household crime. Except House's expression was anything but guilty. "Can I ask you something before you flee?"

Wilson sighed, resigned. "Fine. What is it?"

House squinted thoughtfully into the patient room, both hands wrapped around the head of his cane. Laudenbaum had one hand over the kid's. "What kind of employer...sits by the side of her garden boy in the hospital?"

Typical. House digging into personal territory, destroying lives left and right while saving just as many. And all out of not malice, but simple curiosity, no less.

Wilson turned to observe the two behind the glass. "One who obviously cares about the well-being of her employees," he said, almost dismissively. Not that he quite believed that himself. Even the best employer, if remaining on a completely professional level, would only send flowers and visit once or twice at most. Maybe just a phone call.

"She is a widow," he added, his own curiosity beginning to peak now. Normally, he would scold himself for being so interested in another's personal business, but at the moment, he welcomed the distraction. "Maybe she's lonely."

"If you're lonely when you're that rich, you attend bridge clubs and cocktail parties, you don't hold hands with your lawn boy." House's eyes didn't move from the pair. "No, they're a lot closer than that..."

"Maybe they are." No, not maybe. They just were, anyone could see that. An heiress was closer with her gardener than Wilson was with his own wife. He wasn't sure if that was ironic or just pathetic. "Maybe she lost a grandchild, too. A son."

" She doesn't have any kids."

"You talked to her?" Wilson looked mildly surprised. House never talked to any patient, let alone patient relative, voluntarily unless they were either one, attractive; two, a source of amusement; or three, hiding some deep, dark, juicy secret. Since this lady was neither of the first two..

He glanced at House with slight interest. "So what else did you manage to find out?"

There was a dramatic pause before House leaned in close and whispered conspiratorially, "Her Zodiac sign is Cancer."

Wilson rolled his eyes. "Very medically relevant, I'm sure."

"Of course. Also." House took a deep breath, then began rattling off information like they were stats. "She's a widow, almost divorced. Inherited a massive oil fortune following the death of her husband, and spends the majority of it tending to her expensive gardens, which she stocks from such exotic locales as New Jersey and the base of southeast Asia. Also enjoys sewing, cooking, reading, traveling...Oh, and sleeping with our patient," he tacked on at the end, almost as an afterthought.

"Really." Wilson shook his head, unsurprised at the conclusion. Not because he believed they were sleeping together—although even he couldn't deny the possibility—but because this was, well, House. "And how do you figure that? Because she cares for him?"

"Nope. Because she's wearing his ring." Blue eyes flicked in the direction of Wilson's finger, which was most certainly free of any adornment, gold band or otherwise.

Wilson shifted, but ignored the look. He switched the folder to his right hand and put his left inside the pocket of his lab coat. Three marriages. Three rings. The first one he wore all the way even past the final divorce. The following two were worn only on the day of the wedding. Maybe he was automatically damning himself by doing that, but it was easier. It was too hard to have to take it off after, far too difficult to wear the supposed symbol of fidelity when it was so obviously mocking him, so clearly untrue.

"And I assume you're thinking that her sleeping with him has everything to do with why he's sick?" he asked, pushing his bangs back into place again.

House shrugged. "Could be. She flies him out for a trip, they get wild, next thing you know, junior's wading through a cesspool of Dengue fever." He put on a mock quizzical expression. "Think that's how her husband died?"

Another slightly exasperated roll of the eyes from Wilson. "Doubt it. If you actually looked at the patient history for once, he died of cardiac complications."

House held both hands close to his chest overdramatically. "'Twas the result of a broken heart."

"It could very well have been," Wilson said seriously. "Psychological pain can certainly manifest as the physical."

"Does my _cane_ hitting your leg ring any bells?"

"Yes, well, in certain people, the physical aspect isn't always inflicted upon just themselves, apparently." He gave House a meaningful look.

House snorted. "By that logic, Cuddy should be mowing down terrorists by the plane-full."

The remark managed to evoke a small smile from Wilson. "Cuddy can lead a team of med students currently cramming for their midterms in the fight against terror."

"I'll phone Homeland Security immediately."

Silence followed, but not as awkward as any of the previous ones. Wilson briefly considered going back to his office, but well, he'd lied. His caseload was actually a bit lighter than usual, and returning to the comfortable nest of papers and documents meant moping alone for the rest of the day, as he waited for the final call from his lawyer. Of course, staying with House meant he ran the risk of being psychoanalyzed piece by piece, so...

"You know," House began finally, "psychological pain has also been known to manifest itself in sudden loss of memory."

_Knew it._ Wilson glanced down at his folder again. Maybe he should've left while he had the chance earlier.

"I told you that I've got a lot of patients on my hands right now."

"Most of which can be easily handled by your subordinates." House stepped closer, stopping just short of that boundary of personal space. "You only see cases that are sketchy to treat, or difficult to diagnose, or in which the patient has less than one month to live. Thus begging the question—why is Saralee being treated for cancer in the ophthalmology lounge?"

Wilson shot House a glare, but eventually relinquished. "Alright," he admitted reluctantly. "So maybe I've got something else on my mind. Would it kill you not to poke and prod just for once?"

"I can push and shove."

"Would it kill you not to do that, either?" Wilson threw up his hands. "Or anything else that results in you refusing to…to let go of whatever you've grabbed onto..."

House peered at him keenly. "And allowing it to boil under the surface for several months on end?"

Wilson scratched the back of his neck uncomfortably. "Well...maybe. I don't—" He exhaled loudly. "It's like a splinter. That you know you should dig out, but you don't in hopes that it'll...disappear. On its own. Even though," he added quietly, "you know it won't from your experience with past splinters."

_Oh God, was he building an extended metaphor around splinters? Probably why he was an oncologist and not a poet. _

House looked down at his shoes, his voice taking on the methodical tone that he used to lecture patients about their condition. "But once in awhile, splinter infections can get real nasty, and before you know it, you're in the ER with cephalic tetanus from a wound that should've been cleaned out weeks ago." There was a thoughtful pause. "The U.S. divorce rate is forty-nine percent, tetanus's mortality is forty-five. Our society is better at keeping people from dying—" He raised an eyebrow at Wilson. "—than leaving one another."

Wilson gave a short laugh. "Ironic, isn't it? So much for 'til death do us part."

"…The Latin is less dramatic." House glanced up as he spotted three figures approaching him out of the corner of his eye.

Wilson followed his gaze, then looked back. He managed to catch House's eye for a moment before leaving, deciding that now was as good a time as any. Before House started prodding any deeper. Not that this was the worst conversation he'd ever had with his friend. If he didn't know better, he might've even said House had been less...aggressive.

"LP wasn't definitive," Foreman said, as he stopped in front of his boss. "His CSF showed signs of decreased glucose and mildly elevated protein, but the bacterial, fungal, and viral cultures all came back negative."

There was a moment of silence as the team exchanged looks with each other. Lost, apparently. Again.

House tapped his cane. It wasn't the first time there seemed to be literally no diagnosis, but every time it happened...

"It could still be food poisoning," Cameron said. "Or a food allergy."

House didn't act as though he'd heard her. "What else did the LP show?"

Chase shrugged. "Nothing. Just evidence of meningitis. Other than that..." He shrugged again.

Food allergy...and meningitis. Well, at least the meningitis could be treated. The lumbar puncture had shown no evidence of what kind of meningitis, but tests weren't always accurate anyway. For now, he'd have to rely on the symptoms. It was progressing too slowly to be bacterial, but viral didn't have any specific treatment and it was unlikely to be fungal. And since he already had the kid on the ceftriaxome and vancomycin, there was no point in doing a swap.

"Keep him on the bacterial meds," he said finally. "Cameron and Chase, go break into the rich widow's mansion. Foreman—"

Cameron frowned. "Wait," she interrupted. "Her mansion – why hers, why not the patient's home?" She couldn't believe she was debating rationalizations for committing illegal activities with her boss.

House nodded in the direction of the patient's room. "Woman's been holding the kid's hand day in and day out. Kid's friends say he hangs out with her a lot, probably more than he does in his own house. Besides, dad's not sick."

"Kid's boss isn't sick either," Chase pointed out.

"I'm not talking about a home-based environmental cause," House replied. "Friends tattled, said Mikey ran off with his mistress for a couple of weeks in the summer. I'm guessing they went somewhere exotic. Find out where." He shoved a piece of paper at the remaining team member. "As I was saying, Foreman can go dig through this Korean guy's box of herbs. Meningitis can hide in...rosemary, or whatever the kids cooked up for their demon summoning spell. I suppose we'll entertain Cameron's food poisoning theory, too."

Foreman raised his eyebrows. "Apothecary?"

House tilted his head. "What, surprised I'm not making you break in this time? Don't want the woman to come back home and find all her possessions have been pawned, that's all."

Foreman rolled his eyes.

--o--

Red ginseng. Lizard tail. Green tea. Dried seahorse. And...several horns. He couldn't read the Korean, but it looked like rhino. Maybe. Either way, he was pretty sure that was illegal. Although, the way they left it out in the open like that led him to think perhaps they weren't aware of that fact.

Foreman raised his eyes in to the flickering fluorescent bulbs above (a broken spider web was stuck in a corner) and sighed. Did House really expect him to know the possible of effects of something such as _dried seahorse_ on a human being? If there was anyone who knew that, it would be House himself. The man tended to retain large amounts of what was seemingly useless information—until it saved a life.

Stepping through the narrow aisle lined with bulk bins of...(roots?) and golf-sized nuts of sorts—they looked a little like chestnuts—he approached the counter up front. A seventy-something Asian man was fiddling with a set of metal scales as he measured out a small pile of red powder. There was more of the copper powder on the two sheets of newspaper that were spread out on the glass counter. Entertainment section on top, featuring a black and white of a pregnant Britney Spears. A portion of the local news peeked through with the headline stating in bold black font, "Health officials warn th" before being cut off.

Foreman waited until the shopkeeper glanced up before offering a, "Hi."

_And who wants to bet he doesn't know any English?_

The old man smiled, appearing both confused and surprised—both no doubt due to seeing a black guy in an apothecary of all places. "Hello."

Perfect. One hurdle cleared—he did know English after all.

Foreman cleared his throat a little. "I was wondering about one of your customers. Do you...remember seeing a white kid come in here about a week ago? He bought some herbs or ginseng or something."

"Ah." The man nodded and pulled a package from the shelf. "White ginseng. Yang energy. Make you feel better."

_...or maybe not._

"No, no." Foreman shook his head, waving a hand. "I'm not looking to buy anything," he explained slowly. "I just need to know if you remember a customer of yours. He's young, about seventeen. White."

"Customer?" the shopkeeper repeated blankly. "I have many customer, yes." He tapped the package importantly. "Ginseng very good cooked with chicken."

Foreman scratched the back of his head in frustration. "I am _not_ interested in purchasing anything. Could you just please tell me if you remember—"

Another package was produced, held in the old man's hands like an offering. "_Eunhang._ Ginkgo. Make memory much better," he said gravely, tapping his temple.

There was a moment as Foreman simply stared at the package. All right. Perhaps simply trying again would prove effective.

"Okay," he began. "Can I ask you a question?"

"Of course!" the shopkeeper replied brightly. "Question welcome always."

Foreman leaned forward. "Do you remember a white kid coming in here about a week ago?"

The old man snorted, dropping the ginkgo down on the counter and causing the red powder to scatter a bit on the newspaper. "Kids come in here, they mess my whole store. I tell parents to give them valerian, it get them right away to sleep." He glanced at Foreman curiously. "You have problem sleeping," he stated firmly. "Here, I get for you."

"No, I—"

The shopkeeper wandered off, ridiculously swift on his feet for an old man, and disappeared, oblivious to the protests.

Foreman sighed and leaned back against the counter. He glanced at his watch. Fifteen minutes. Fifteen minutes of zero progress.

He hoped Cameron and Chase were having better luck. Well, either that, or he hoped they were getting arrested or otherwise equally screwed over.

--o--

The mansion was large, expansive, and utterly devoid of any security beyond the usual lock and key that they, as House's staffers, had grown accustomed to navigating. There were several fenced entrances, a hurricane door securely locked by the basement, but beyond the sheer size of the residence's grounds, little else stood in the way of their illegal search.

Cameron turned for a second to admire the view.

A Dutch gabled roof spread over several wings of the mansion, done up in painted brick and stucco, to slant down over the stone patio at the structure's far end. Its arches made it almost resemble a courtyard from old Spanish times, and the lush, effulgent garden that covered the majority of the terrace certainly added to that mystique. After spending just a few minutes looking through the nursery, she could already appreciate the massive amounts of time and staff that must be required for its upkeep.

Unfortunately, neither she nor Chase found anything diagnostically relevant outside (the pesticides had been checked, the plants were perfectly harmless), or on the ground floor of the mansion. Which led them to…the bedroom.

"Did you notice the tension between House and Dr. Wilson lately?"

Chase blinked at the unusual question. "That's the first and foremost thing on your mind, House and Dr. Wilson?" He turned, eyeing his colleague.

"No." Cameron shrugged and went back to rifling through several papers in the corner. "But you can't ignore the fact that they act as if they've been feuding all day. Normally, House at least tries to be civil when Wilson's around."

"Actually, he doesn't." Pulling open a dresser drawer, Chase studied the lingerie for a second (frilled…lace?), before closing it again. "It just seems that way because Dr. Wilson doesn't blow up like everybody else."

"Snapping during the DDx? Slamming his cane into textbooks? Insulting the guy's medical abilities in front of our faces?" Cameron shut the bathroom cabinets with a bang. "That doesn't strike you as personal?" She got up and walked over to the bathtub, where several cooking magazines, along with a scented candle, stood neatly arranged beneath the narrow skylight. The tag said Made in China. "House may be a great diagnostician, but he knows when a specialty is out of his range."

Chase paused for a second, considering the thought, then shrugged dismissively. "I suppose. So what? House probably stepped over the line again, like he always does. Stole a lolly from a cancer kid." He pulled open the doors to the large walk-in closet. "If it's with Dr. Wilson, I wouldn't worry about it. House always gets forgiven eventually."

"Yeah. Like he gets away with clinic hours," Cameron responded wryly. She put away the last of the bottled items on the countertop and made her way back to the entrance, empty-handed. "There's nothing here. We should check the kitchen."

"Already looked," Chase replied, exiting the closet. "There might be something in the library though." He started to make his way down the hall.

"This place has a library?"

"Well, yeah. They all do." Her colleague blinked, as if it were obvious.

"Sorry." Cameron rolled her eyes defensively. "I didn't grow up in big, lavish mansions."

"Probably better that way. Nice not to know what you're missing." Chase glanced up at the tall, tiered ceilings with a wistful look on his face, and almost immediately, Cameron regretted her sharp words earlier. It was obvious her colleague still missed his home back in Melbourne after all these years. Ever since Chase's father had passed away, the other man spoke little of his past or even the wealthy inheritance he would no doubt be receiving at the end of his fellowship. Perhaps it was a result of realizing you were an orphan, alone in this world.

Cameron smiled apologetically over at her colleague. "An Olympic-size bathroom and lots of cleaning. I can live without that."

Chase chuckled, and smiled back at her. "Actually...if you've got money for a washroom that large, you tend to have enough for a cleaning service, as well." Stepping up, he pulled a book off the library shelf, which sent a flurry of dust flying in every direction.

"Obviously, it hasn't touched the library in several years." Cameron wrinkled her nose. She walked over to the other side of the room, where an extensive wall-to-wall bookshelf stood, and began scanning its contents. Nothing that looked foreign yet…although plenty of rare novels that must have cost a hefty sum to both locate and acquire. This shelf in particular seemed dedicated to botanical books. "Perennial Gardening: A Guide to Modern Horticulture." Cameron blinked, and put the volume back. "She really loves her plants."

"Rich people are also frequently cheap." Across the room, Chase was busily studying the spine of a completely different book. "The Poisoned Chocolates Case?" He paused in bemusement. "Guess she also loves her mysteries."

"I wonder if there's any Sherlock Holmes around here..." Cameron mused idly aloud. There were few fiction authors she liked more than Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, with his elegant writing and clever, intricate plotlines. If any of his work was kept here, it was bound to be a classic, something well-worn and leatherbound and hefty…kind of like…

"The Life and Death of Mozart." She blinked. Alright, so perhaps not _that_ hefty. "This thing's well over 800 pages."

Chase peered at it from over her shoulder. "It's like medical school all over again."

Reaching the end of his bookcase search, he wandered over to the marble sculpture on the center table, where a few odd manuscripts were stacked. Looked like Laudenbaum took a stab at writing herself, though most of what lay here were sketches and notes on the proper tools for gardening. Nothing that would suggest foreign travel…unless her research brought her out of the country, but it was unlikely someone like Michael would accompany her to a place like –

His thoughts were interrupted by a rather sudden observation from Cameron.

"...These body postures can't be right! You could...break a leg or twist your spine getting into that position."

Chase glanced up, eyes widening. "What are you – ?"

Cameron flipped the cover over for him to see. "Tibetan yoga." She laughed at her colleague's shocked expression. "What, you think she'd leave the Kama Sutra lying around?"

Chase shook his head, not sure whether to be amused or relieved. "You never know what her husband might've been into." Impatiently, he tossed down the papers on the table. "There isn't anything useful here. We should look somewhere else."

"I'll take the office." Cameron started over to the corner enclave.

"I'll be in the next room." Turning, Chase wandered through a side door and into what looked to be a slightly modernized version of the old, Victorian sewing room, its walls painted an ivory white. There were several chairs arranged around a wooden coffee table, and a cabinet stood by the entrance holding many colors of thread. In the corner, a small, glass enclosure opened up into a garden. Chase looked at it, puzzled. "There's a greenhouse connected here. Odd." He started rummaging through the papers lying on the center table.

"Maybe she keeps some plants that can't stand the outdoors."

"I meant it's next to the sewing room. I've never seen it done this way before." He kept flipping, ignoring the weathered, personal letters to pick up a crisply opened envelope sitting atop the stack. Its contents spilled out into his hand.

"Ah hah!"

Cameron poked her head through the door at the sound, eyebrows raised in a silent question.

"Found something."

--o--

"Two plane tickets to Laos." Chase held the tickets up triumphantly between his fingers. "Booked about three months ago."

Slowly, House lowered the magazine in his hands (_Cosmopolitan_ – the centerfold was priceless this month) and refocused his eyes on the thin pieces of paper shoved beneath his nose. Blinked.

"They fly first class?"

The other man rolled his eyes in exasperation. "Melioidosis. It fits. Respiratory symptoms, flu-like illness, even the meningitis complication."

"Plus, it would explain why he recovered temporarily when we gave him the penicillin," Cameron added helpfully.

House considered the various symptoms for a bit, then shrugged. "Perfect. Start him on 40 mg IV ceftazidime." He got up from his position at his desk, and began limping toward the door.

"Shouldn't we get a definitive diagnosis first?" Cameron turned to eye her boss.

"Treatment's faster," House replied without looking back. "Wouldn't want our golden boy to _die_ before those cultures grow out."

Suddenly, he paused at the exit.

"Where's Foreman?"

--o--

Foreman had just made his way through a dozen different drawers of spices, several layers of herbal leaves, a dumpster filled with ginseng root, and one nasty snarl of a traffic jam to arrive finally, thankfully, intact at the entrance of Princeton Plainsboro Teaching Hospital. Of course, the first thing he managed to do was nearly run over his two fellow colleagues.

"Whoa, there." Chase slowed and turned around with Cameron. "Where've you been?"

Foreman sighed irritably. "Did you _miss_ the part where House sent me to dig around in ginseng?"

Chase sniffed at the other's coat, which now carried the sharp, pungent smell of Korean herbs, and wrinkled his nose. "He never said to bring any back."

"I thought they'd help with the healing," Foreman replied dryly. He pointedly changed the subject. "How's the patient?"

"We found two plane tickets to Laos in his employer's sewing room. House said to test for meliodosis," Cameron replied.

Foreman looked mildly interested. "A lot more than what I found."

"Which was?"

"Absolutely nothing," he said sarcastically. "Whatever they threw into their drinking potion isn't the cause of this."

"Well." Chase shrugged. "His father should be pleased."

They continued down the hallway toward the patient rooms, where the IV treatment had just been started.

"So, what crazy idea did House come up with from the tickets?" Foreman asked.

"He thinks that…Michael and Laudenbaum are closer than employee and employer, and she took him on a trip there over the summer for illicit purposes." Cameron rolled her eyes disbelievingly at another one of her boss's cynical theories.

"More than he'd ever do for us," Chase muttered ironically.

"As if, any two people who care for each other must be sleeping together."

"Yeah, try telling House that." Foreman chuckled. "Of course...if you spend that much money on your employee, there's got to be _something_ going on."

"Well, does it really matter if they're having sex or not? They're both old enough to make that decision." For someone who usually took pleasure in gossiping about patients, Chase seemed unusually defensive.

"They're friends!" Cameron threw her hands up in exasperation. "She's a nice lady, he's an honest kid. Probably thinks of him as a son, or nephew, or something."

"You could be right," Foreman acceded. "Maybe we've got ourselves a rare normal patient for once." An abrupt beeping sounded almost before he could finish his sentence.

Chase glanced down at his pager. Immediately, his expression turned serious.

"Something's wrong."

Without wasting a moment, they all rushed quickly down the halls to the ICU, where Michael's room was located. The curtains had been pushed back. Inside, two figures moved around in great agitation. Upon entering, the first sound to greet them was the frantic beep of the life-monitoring equipment, plummeting rapidly.

"He just started...coughing, and then we couldn't get him to stop..." Laudenbaum looked up at them wide-eyed, fear etched across her face. At the bed, the patient's father was clinging desperately to his son, as if by sheer force of will, he could reverse the tide of the swiftly debilitating illness.

"Michael! Michael, can you speak?"

He received no response.

Chase placed his stethoscope on the boy's chest and listened for a few seconds, then looked up. "He's going into respiratory arrest. Call the code!"

Foreman went immediately for the phones.

"There's fluid in his lungs," Cameron observed, her eyebrows wrinkling at the sight of the alveoli on the CG display. That was definitely not due to melioidosis.

"No time for a thoracostomy." Her colleague glanced at the respiration monitor. "His O2 stats are dropping too fast, we've got to intubate."

Seconds later, the crash cart arrived. Chase instantly snatched up a laryngoscope from the top drawer. He inserted the blade into the mouth of the patient, who by now had fallen unconscious, then reached for the ventilation tube held out for him by the nurse. Several moments passed as he worked the device down Michael's throat.

"He's stabilizing." Foreman braced the boy's head on the bed, casting a concerned eye at the BP monitors. "Blood pressure's holding steady."

Cameron breathed a sigh of relief.

Stepping back, Chase brushed aside a stray lock of his hair and turned to face his other two colleagues. They both looked grim.

Whatever this was, it had only gotten worse with the treatment.

--o--

The blinds were shut in the conference room, closing out the night. Chase sat leaning forward, elbows planted on the table and chin resting on his interlaced fingers. "Patient's deteriorating fast," he said, stating the obvious for lack of a better introduction. "His temperature's spiked up to one-oh-two, pulse ninety-seven, BP one-twenty over seventy, RR sixteen. We had to put him back on the ventilator."

"Antibiotics clearly aren't doing anything." Cameron started to stand up to refill her coffee, but sat back down when she saw the pot was empty.

House leaned against the edge of the table, studying the whiteboard. "Or they're doing something, just not what we want them to."

"You think it's the ceftazidime?" Foreman asked skeptically from where he was perched on the chair's backrest, foot on the seat.

"No." House furrowed his eyebrows and tilted his head, as though there was a secret message behind the whiteboard that would be revealed if he stared a certain way. Like those Magic Eye things. "What do his O2 stats show?"

Chase dropped his hands onto the table, fingers still interlocked. "PaO2 less than seventy." He stifled a yawn. "It's not looking good."

"If we don't do something soon, the kid's going to end up in another respiratory arrest," Foreman said, giving his watch a brief glance as if he were expecting the patient to stop breathing any minute. "With the condition he's in, he might not make it through this time."

"Of course we have to do something, but what?" Cameron pushed her empty coffee mug aside. "None of his symptoms are matching up to anything specific. The flu, ARDS, and meningitis all rolled into one?"

Chase glanced back at Cameron. "Who says meningitis is a complication? It could be something entirely separate."

"He developed it while he was here," Foreman replied. "Besides, there's almost no way for him to have contracted it outside, either."

Cameron hesitated. "We could go back to the TB differential. Meningitis can result from TB, and now that we know he's been to Laos—"

"BCG vaccination," Foreman said. "He got it before he took his trip. They both did."

"BCG can only give between seventy and eighty percent protection," Chase pointed out.

"It's not like he was diving into the jungles with the village people." Foreman shifted slightly. "He stayed in a five star resort in a made-for-tourist area. Chances of him contracting it are extremely slim. Urine shows no abnormalities common to TB, either."

House, who by now had moved onto actually sitting on the table rather than just leaning against it, spoke up suddenly as he leaned some of his weight onto his cane. "What if the disease...came to the _patient_ instead of the other way around?"

Foreman looked up, shook his head. "It's nothing from Korea. The shopkeepers live just upstairs. They're there twenty-four seven and both are healthy as ever. Patient says he shopped there before, too, always buys the same stuff. It's not the herbs."

House considered a moment before turning to look at Chase. "And the mansion?"

Chase shrugged. "You mean, aside from the plane tickets?"

"Dust, books, and fancy marble floors," Cameron said. "Nothing out of the ordinary."

"Well, except for the architecture," Chase added. "She's got a greenhouse connected to the sewing room."

House narrowed his eye, standing up suddenly. "Why didn't you mention this earlier?"

Chase looked surprised at the sudden focus on what was supposed to be an offhand remark. "I…didn't think it was relevant."

"Yeah, I tell you to check for evidence of exotic diseases, and you don't think a hidden garden is relevant." House was clearly irritated. "Did she keep anything unusual in it? Pesticides, fertilizer, anything with foreign labels on it."

"She might've, I didn't exactly explore the place—"

"Did you notice _anything_ at all?"

"Plants?" Chase replied, his initial fluster morphing into irritation at being put on the spot. "It's a greenhouse. She probably had a couple bags of fertilizer, but I doubt she'd go through the trouble of importing foreign stuff. We already checked all the pesticides for toxins," he added defensively.

"I didn't ask what you checked, I asked what was in the greenhouse." House threw out an arm, clearly annoyed. "What _kind_ of plants were they?"

"I don't know, I'm not a botanist." Chase shot a glance at Cameron, who seemed equally lost on the subject, before looking back at House. "They were _plants_," he said at last, lamely. "Green, leafy." He demonstrated the leafiness with a wave of his hand. "With lots of soil."

_Soil?_

House turned suddenly without a word, limping quickly out of the conference room. The glass door barely had time to swing shut before Foreman, who was closest to it, yanked it open again to follow, not bothering to hold it for the others. Cameron managed to slip through the rapidly closing gap with no trouble, leaving Chase to fend for himself. He gave the door an annoyed tug, catching up to his two teammates in time to hear House's voice echo through the corridors.

"You idiot!"

Laudenbaum spun around, her fur coat draped over her left arm.

House waved his cane in her direction. "You told me he only worked on the gardens outside."

"Why…yes." The woman replied slowly, confused. "I don't keep any plots indoors."

"Yeah. Right. And that greenhouse you built in your sewing room was just there to set off the wallpaper."

"What do you mean?" Her heels clicked as she took a step back.

"The _greenhouse_." House was losing his patience. "You know, the one you kept hidden away so your garden buddies wouldn't find it? Did you keep any Brazilian plants in it?"

She shook her head emphatically. "No, never."

House stared up exasperatedly at the heavens before turning his gaze back on her. "Anything from South America, Honduras, the Great Lakes…"

"Michael doesn't work with the flowers in there. He hardly ever – " Laudenbaum abruptly stopped. "Oh, my." A slow look of understanding spread across her face, as memory dawned upon her. House waited for the inevitable light bulb. "That one time, he wanted to transplant a…a gift from an old friend of mine into the courtyard outside. Said it was better for the African orchid to spread its roots outside. I'd kept it in the greenhouse till then." She glanced up, worried. "Do you think that's what made him ill?"

And…the lady asks if fermented soil from the deepest jungles of Africa could possibly carry disease. House resisted the urge to commit violent acts with his cane.

"Your boy has blastomycosis. Usually endemic to the Mississippi and Ohio river basins, but also known to frequent certain parts of Africa." House paced around unevenly with the aid of his cane. "Now, normally, this fungus resides in the soil until a great, big wind comes sweeping through to blow the spores into the air. Which, wouldn't have been a problem…if you had planted it outside." He gestured with one hand. "Air is dry, weather cold, breeze would've diluted it into harmless bits. However." Abruptly, House stopped in front of the patient door. "In the moist, wet atmosphere of the greenhouse, the spores thrived. And when garden boy over there decided to poke his fingers in the dirt for the first time…well, we all know how much little green fungi just love human flesh."

"So all of this was caused by…" She paused, appearing incredulous at the words she was about to say next. "By some _soil_ I bought several years ago?"

"There's a reason why customs won't allow illegal imports from third world countries." House turned back to his three staffers, who had by now caught up to his tirade. "Start him on Amphotericin B, and he should be fine by morning."

--o--

"Solved another case?"

"Yup. And avoided a day's clinic duty too."

Wilson smiled weakly, hands shoved in pockets, and went to stand beside his friend. "I get the feeling you're prouder of the latter accomplishment."

He followed House's gaze through the window of the patient ward, where Michael was sharing a private moment with his benefactress and friend. The boy had sprung right back after only a day's treatment, already demanding to be let out so he could finish his DND session despite a still-present (but receding) cough. Wilson chuckled inwardly at the scene beyond the glass. Kids would be kids. Something humorous must have been said, because the boy suddenly screwed up his face into an exaggerated parody of what could only be House's "pondering" expression (the scrunched up eyebrows always gave it away), which elicited a laugh from the other woman. As he watched, Laudenbaum leaned in to give Michael a peck on the cheek, a warm gesture that brought a smile to both their lips.

Wilson sighed and lowered his gaze. These were the happy endings. Another case solved, another disaster averted, another couple reunited from the brink of death. He imagined there must be something about that last experience that brought two people together. Crisis, mortality, or perhaps fate. He'd seen it several times before, a bright shine in the eyes of his patients as they learned their fears were unfounded or the tumor was receding or the operation had been a success…then proceeded to move on with their lives, new energy buoying a lover's devotion, while he watched vicariously from the back.

As for the rest, they passed away, inevitably, in his care.

"So…he did more than fix her garden, huh?" Wilson asked, if only to break the silence.

House responded with a predictable snipe. "If by fixing her garden, you mean – "

Wilson cleared his throat loudly. "Yes, I...get it." Pulling up a chair, he sat down and let his thoughts drift aloud, knowing full well where this would get him with House, but for once, not particularly caring. "Well. There are some people who feel that age gaps don't matter. That love is a matter of the heart, something which attracts fellow souls together – not actual physical bodies."

He waited masochistically for the first shot to be fired.

…Only to be caught off-guard by the simple question that followed next.

"Do you?"

Wilson glanced up in surprise, sure he'd heard the last words wrong. But no. There was House, looking over at him expectantly, novel curiosity etched all across his features.

"Are you asking me…personally? Or in regards to other people?" He tilted his head thoughtfully, giving both the question and his friend's purpose in asking it some serious consideration. "I think...that it isn't something I can decide on unless I get there myself. As for others, if they both believe in it enough…" Wilson shrugged. "Anything can work."

"Belief is the origin of faith," House replied derisively. "You have enough of it, you can get people to do anything for you. Lie, cheat, steal." He let his eyes drift over the scene beyond the window again. "Even risk their own lives just to continue living in that fake bubble of comfort."

"Everybody has a bubble of comfort." Wilson shook his head and looked over at his companion. "Even if it's something others would find...miserable."

There was a second when their eyes met, a brief flicker in the other's cynical gaze before House turned away and muttered lowly at the floor, "Misery is hubris." He tilted his head in the direction of the patient. "Those two, on the other hand...they've got the blind faith market all but cornered. You don't balk at a failing marriage unless you're up to your ears in sand."

"You mean, if you're up to your ears in a different pile of sand than your partner." Wilson sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. "It's not living in a bubble of denial that's the problem, it's living in two separate ones."

"Maybe they should make bubbles with doors then."

Wilson snorted wryly. "Yes, well, unfortunately, the whole concept of a bubble is that it eventually pops. Rudely and abruptly."

"Slow, agonizing disintegration would be far more preferable."

It took James several seconds to register the sarcasm in that last line, whether real or imagined, and he wondered momentarily if there was some truth to the statement after all. Three marriages, twenty years of his life, and every time the final break came, it still came from her end. Oh, no doubt there was tension, that was obvious enough. The long hours, subtle signs, his…infidelity – those markers he could see from a mile away. But actual divorce? Wilson had to laugh at his own naiveté. Sudden shock wouldn't describe the half of it. If there ever was a way to ease the transition from being married to sitting in a courtroom, eyes fixed on the cheap panel wall, dusty and old, as you listened to your private life stripped bare for all the public to see, he would take it in a heartbeat. Added pain was worth the slow dissolution of denial.

After all, if anyone knew about long, drawn out psychological pain, it was Gregory House.

"...There are things, though, that can make a temporary bubble in isolation."

Wilson turned to meet his friend's gaze of heavy significance. "Are you suggesting what I think you are?"

House's lips quirked into a smile.

"Gotta finish that drinking game somehow."


	6. Chapter 5

**Title:** Pathology  
**Rating:** PG  
**Pairing:** None  
**Description:** In the middle of recovering from a hangover, House gets an unusual consult letter from an old acquaintance of his. Its contents draw him   
**Author's Note:** This chapter and the next are mostly plot setup for the coming plague scenario, so enjoy the mystery and House's manipulative scheming...because there's a lot of bigger troubles about to come crashing down.

The unfamiliarity of it all was what first hit him. The lack of his usual bed, the presence of a rougher fabric, the differences in weight between his normal blanket and the sheet that had been thrown carelessly over him. There was no pillow. Instead, a couch cushion had been shoved under his head. His head, which was currently throbbing like hell.

_Ohhh...Jesus._

Wilson sat up gingerly, testing the waters. A wave of nausea hit him. Bile rose up his throat.

He immediately lay back down, one hand pressed to his pounding temple.

Okay, so perhaps attempting to sit up a bit later would be a good idea. He'd forgotten what it was like to suffer a massive hangover. Not since college and the few years just after graduation (the completion of med school pretty much requiring a huge, celebratory bash to compensate for the three years of hell ahead of them) had he consumed this much alcohol.

...Although no, that wasn't quite true. There was that time after his first marriage fell apart. And then of course, it had happened again after his second marriage fell apart.

Now it was his third. Apparently, he was going for a pattern here. House, ever the one to put the pieces together, had undoubtedly noticed and taken full advantage of it. Wilson wondered briefly how long it would be before his friend actually published this discovery in a journal. The Wilson Drinks-Divorce Correlation.

_Nope, not gonna think about your crappy marriage luck, Jimmy. You need something that'll make your hangover better, not worse._

Of course, making his hangover better required getting up and grabbing something to relieve his headache, and he wasn't quite positive he was ready for that yet.

Something else then. Figuring out what exactly occurred last night, perhaps. Clearly, there was drinking involved. And considering he was on the lumpy couch again, House was definitely a part of this. Which was…good, in a way — Wilson didn't think he wanted to be inebriated around anyone else.

So, drinking and...a game? A drinking game. And something about the time or directions...He could also remember a bad thing happening. Getting kicked out. Because House broke something, or insulted someone. Or both. Yes, it was most likely both.

Wilson made another attempt to sit up. It was a little better this time, but not by much. Still, he managed to keep everything in his stomach, and that was all that mattered.

He ran one hand through his hair, peeling the blanket off of his body with the other. His shirt was untucked, and without looking, he could definitely tell that his collar was unbuttoned.

His eyes shifted to the floor, where his tie was sprawled haphazardly on the floor. Wilson leaned over slowly and picked it up, tossing it onto the coffee table next to box of sandwich crackers. His joints were stiff and his body ached, but not in any place that would induce concern, which was more than he could say for the last time this sort of thing happened.

He needed a shower. He needed a change of clothes. He needed to brush his teeth. He needed...he needed...

He needed to throw up.

Wilson stumbled off the couch, cursing under his breath as he tripped over one of his own discarded shoes. House's apartment was small, but it never seemed so large until right now, when the contents of his stomach was doing a tapdance against the back of his throat. He swallowed hard, trying to keep last night's dinner (mostly liquid) all down as he navigated his way to the bathroom…only to find it locked tight. A yellow light from within peeked out through the crack beneath the door.

Wilson jiggled the doorknob a little desperately.

"Occupied!" The voice that called back was more than a little unsteady and hoarse, and muffled by the door.

_Oh...please no._

Wilson pounded on the door, his words coming out in a rush. "House, come on, I'm not feeling so great either."

"Shouldn't've tossed that last martini," House muttered, more to himself than anyone else. Very obvious heaving sounds filtered through the bathroom door. "S' an awful homebrew."

Not trusting himself to speak at this point, Wilson only stumbled away from the bathroom and hurried towards the next available sink — the kitchen. It was stacked full of dirty dishes, which he managed to clear about half of before emptying last night's tequila and vodka down the drain. A few solid pieces swirled among the mess, probably the remains of those crackers left on the coffee table. Little else was evident. Wilson recalled contemplating dinner sometime between midnight and one, and then immediately discarding it in favor of a much more pleasant buzz. No doubt at House's urging.

He twisted the taps, the noise from the spray of water only amplifying his massive headache, and closed his eyes briefly.

Water. Right, water was the next step. Water and a painkiller. Tylenol or something. He knew House had some around here.

Wilson began rummaging through the cupboards, careful not to mess the contents up anymore than they already were. Half a bottle of cough syrup, Claratin, Polysporin, several empty prescription bottles...but no painkillers. Irony struck him in the face. Where were those little white tablets when you needed them? Of course, the fact that he hadn't turned on the kitchen lights probably wasn't aiding his search, but he knew any sort of illumination at this juncture would only make matters a hundred times worse.

He'd just about given up on the painkiller search and had moved onto opening another cupboard for a glass when someone grabbed his hand and shoved a cylindrical object inside. He jumped, startled, and spun to face his friend, who was gripping the edge of the kitchen sink unsteadily.

"Just drink from the tap," House said, waving at the still-running water.

Wilson opened his palm. It took him a couple of seconds to register the white tablet in his hand, with the words _Tylenol_ engraved on one side. He tossed the pill in his mouth and scooped a handful of water, then swallowed it all.

He shut off the water with a groan and buried his face in his arm. "I'll never make it through work."

"That's why you're calling in sick," House stated matter-of-factly, walking slowly out of the kitchen. "For the both of us." Wilson followed, catching up just in time to witness his friend pushing aside the living room curtains.

"Ow." Wilson winced, turning his back on the light and shielding his eyes. Jesus, it was bright out there.

Really bright. In fact, _too_ bright to just be morning.

"Oh my God," he said, his heart starting to race. He automatically flipped up his wrist, but there was no watch. "Oh my God. What time is it?"

House had already snapped the curtains shut again and was blinking rapidly in obvious pain. "That...definitely hit a seven on the Richter scale. I'm guessing 11:02 A.M," he answered, speaking with hardly a pause.

"Eleven?" Wilson echoed incredulously. "_Eleven_? Oh no." He began hurrying towards House's closet, where he knew he still had a few items of clothing from the last time he stayed over. "Oh God, I'm screwed," he muttered, yanking out a pair of pants and a shirt.

"You'll be even more screwed when Cuddy finds out where you've been picking up babes all night," House called over his shoulder. Wilson heard a creak as his friend flopped down on the couch.

"I'm not worried about Cuddy," Wilson said, snatching his tie up from the coffee table. "I had a patient meeting an hour ago, I promised her. _You_ should be worried about Cuddy."

"Yeah, lunch and a date go real well with a hangover," House sniped back, curled up in the corner of the couch. "You can tell her all about the five strippers you were slipping it to in the alleyway."

For a split second, Wilson was actually worried there might've been some truth to that statement, but then he shook his head. "I was drunk, House, I wasn't on crystal meth." With his pants, shirt, and tie all draped over one arm, he headed for the bathroom and shut the door. "And it's not a date!" he yelled, not certain if House could hear him from where he was. "It's a meeting!"

"That's what you said right before you moved in with your cancer patient." House's voice echoed just outside the door.

"Actually, I said I found another place, but I take it that's not the point." Wilson pulled open the door and poked his head out, still buttoning his shirt quickly with one hand. "If you're calling in sick, you'd better call now before Cuddy comes hunting for you."

House waved a hand dismissively. "I'll call when I have the time." He rolled his pill bottle back and forth over the back of his fingers a few times, then tossed it in the air and caught it. "_You_ need to pick up my Vicodin at the pharmacy today."

Wilson turned around, a comb in his hand. "Yes, of course, Master. I fall all over my feet to get the opportunity to run errands for you." He looked back into the mirror, struggling to neaten his hair as fast as possible without tearing the strands out by the roots. His whole head was a mess, the tangled locks sticking every which way like he'd walked through an electrostatic generator with a sweater on. "Get one of your team to do it. Chase. Cameron. Foreman, if you feel like getting hung up on."

"Chase can't even get the bottle cap off right," House replied, ignoring the fact that he sometimes couldn't, either. He tossed the empty bottle up and down in his hand. "Besides, you were the one who pill-tossed them all into cocktail oblivion." Catching the translucent orange bottle one last time, he tossed it again — aiming for Wilson's head this time. It hit its mark neatly.

"Ow. Hey!" Wilson spun around, one hand flying to the back of his head, then immediately felt dizzy as the room twirled about him. He glanced at the bottle, now lying on the bathroom tiles, and considered picking it up, but that would require leaning down, which he was definitely _not_ doing in this nauseous state.

"I clearly remember you had ten," he said, adjusting his tie. "Which you dumped out and left behind on the bar counter." He flipped off the bathroom lights and stepped out, reaching down for the overcoat that had been tossed on the floor. "What's more important?" he asked, throwing the coat over his shoulders. "Skipping work and missing your meds, or going there and hiding in your office while _still_ skipping work with all thirty-six Vicodin in hand?"

House tilted his head, pretending to actually weigh the two choices. "How about... skipping work, hiding at home, and still getting all my meds thanks to the courageous travails of Dr. James Wilson, Boy Wonder Oncologist? Your car's at the bar, you know," he added as Wilson made his way to the front door.

That was true. But…

"Luckily, your isn't." There was a jingle as Wilson snatched House's car keys from their usual spot on top of the piano. He paused at the door and turned around. "And no, I'm not going to get your pills."

"You know, our friendship used to mean more than this!" House called as the door slammed shut. "Back when Vogler fired you," he added with a mutter. He sighed, leaning against the wall. His leg really was starting to hurt again, in addition to the crescendoed throbbing of his head and back. Wilson had a point: with the patient in recovery (presumably, given the lack of urgent messages on his pager), he could easily hide in his office and other various corners of the hospital in an attempt to shirk clinic duty as well as get his meds. And it wasn't as if his car was gone by now. He had no doubt that Wilson would wait at least ten minutes for him before actually driving off.

Besides, he was already dressed, technically, having slept in his clothes last night. Or this morning. Whatever time it was when they got back.

Grabbing his cane, he slowly hobbled out the door, not bothering to lock it behind him.

--o--

Some people in the world were walking dictionaries. Others were walking calculators. Dr. Lisa Cuddy was a walking atomic clock. Two, actually, since she needed an entirely separate one to keep track of all the hours of work her diagnostics head missed so she could balance it against all the lives he saved, and thus justify his continued employment to the board every time pay period came around. Currently, the scale was tipping in favor of House's demise. 

Rounding a corner, she spotted the culprit in question making a bee-line for the elevators, his rather…photophobic companion (by the looks of the arm that was shielding Wilson's face) in tow. James seemed nothing like his normally impeccable self, although House certainly was none the worse for wear – this wasn't his first time, after all – which could mean only one of two things. Since the duo practically had a Just Got Smashed sign strapped to their backs, Cuddy opted for the less graphic of the two.

She took little time in intercepting the situation.

"_Two_ department heads late. Interesting." Cuddy came to a halt right in front of the elevators, heels clicking as she blocked off her negligent employees' escape route. Her gaze shifted from House's sunglasses to Wilson's raccoon eyes and rumpled, slept-in clothing, all but unheard of in the usually meticulous oncology head. He was trying his best to screen the light with his hand, while not looking entirely too obvious. "You should've gotten him a pair, too," Cuddy observed with cynical guile. "Then you two could match."

"I did." House pulled out a set of brightly colored two-tone plastic sunglasses, complete with garish flower petal rims. It was a prize from the bottom of his cereal box. "He wouldn't wear them."

Wilson looked embarrassed. "We just – " He grasped for a plausible excuse that would explain away headache, nausea, and sensitivity to light, but decided both he and House contracting rabies on the same day was perhaps not the most believable justification. Besides, Lisa knew them all too well for any last minute lies to work. "We came in as fast as we could. House, unsurprisingly, has no alarm clock." Rubbing at his neck, he cast a nervous glance at his companion before turning to smile weakly back at his boss.

Cuddy did not look impressed. "I don't want to hear about it." She swiveled her glare over to House. "I suppose when I hired you, I should've taken out some late days in addition to setting aside a budget for your legal expenses."

"It's not late if I don't have any work to do," House pointed out.

"No, you don't have any _cases_," Cuddy corrected. "You do, however, have clinic duty." She glanced vaguely in the direction of his derelict companion. "And you have...your cancer patients."

House pointed at Wilson. "He's got a date."

"It's not a date, it's a _meeting_." Wilson sighed, exasperated.

"Yeah, right." House gave him a knowing look, then leaned in to whisper confidentially, one thumb cocked in the direction of his boss, "That's what she called it too, right before she hired me."

"Strange," Cuddy broke in loudly. "I remember an entirely different word that day coming out of you." There was an awkward moment as the two old nemeses squared off in the middle of the lobby, as passing nurses and wandering patients glanced curiously in their direction, then turned to whisper among themselves. Wilson caught a 'head' and a 'sleeping' and a 'but they say his friend is…' before getting cut off by his boss's marching orders.

"Get back to work."

As if on cue, the elevator arrived.

Inside, safely inside, ensconced in a web of comfortable emptiness, Wilson stared silently at the dim floor lights. Several minutes passed before he decided to spring the innocent question.

"...So what word did you use?"

House answered just as the elevator doors slid open.

"Ask your cancer patient."

They parted ways at the nurse's station, House steadfastly refusing to acknowledge the whole affair while Wilson smirked, amused, then hurried off to his own corner office. There would be other times to bring up this specific matter.

With a sigh and a limp, House pushed open the door to the conference room where his three staffers were currently busying themselves with…looking not particularly busy, given the lack of substantive greeting. Foreman was seated at the center table, legs propped up as he perused this morning's _Washington Post_, a mug of coffee by his left hand. He turned a page, but didn't glance up at House's approach. Cameron had gone back to saving...three-legged puppies or blind orca whales on the Internet, and Chase, as always, was entertaining himself with a crossword puzzle and an oral fixation for number two pencils in the back corner.

Lovely. The treatment had worked.

Cameron looked up from her computer. "The patient's doing better. His lungs are – "

"Don't need to hear it if it's good." House cut her off with a wave of his hand, and cane walked his way slowly toward the coffee maker. He started pouring himself a large mug.

"It's not important for you to hear the patient status?" Cameron asked reproachfully.

House took a long, deep draft from his coffee mug, nearly downing the entire cup. His eyes fluttered shut for a few moments.

"Ahhh." Shaking his head, he drifted back down to reality, much improved. "Better than Prozac." A bright smile spread across his lips, as he removed his sunglasses and set his empty mug down on the countertop. "Reader's digest version." He nodded at his subordinates. "Did he live, or did he die?"

Chase was the first to respond. "He's alive."

"And…improving, by the lack of whiteboard symptoms." House turned in the direction of his beloved office accessory, where the series of symptoms he'd had listed the day before were now neatly crossed out one by one, an indicator of the patient's marked improvement. Only the CBC levels and cough remained.

"Well, his white count's still up, but he's going through the recovery stages," Foreman reported at the silent prompting of his boss. "His cough's better, too, although...it is somewhat persistent." He shrugged and turned back to his newspaper. "But it should be clearing up in another couple of weeks."

"So says the neurologist, who thought it was meningitis all along. I'm going to catch up on some sleep." House paused on his way to his office long enough to tap Chase's crossword with his cane. "Yersinia pestis, thirteen down." The look of irritation it earned him was summarily ignored.

Pushing open the glass door, he was immediately greeted by a hefty stack of consult letters in the middle of his desk, right between his juggling balls and the latest edition of _Sports Illustrated: Swimsuit Edition_. They sat there neatly, waiting, held down by his monster truck paperweight. There was no indication that anyone had bothered to sort or otherwise discard of them.

"What happened to my trash collector?" he asked as he picked his way toward his seat.

Cameron called back from in front of her computer, "You always toss everything away anyway. Look through it yourself if you think it's worth salvaging."

"_That's_ what my secretaries are for," House replied, glancing pointedly at his staff.

"Yes, I'm sure secretaries save lives _and_ answer the mail on a daily basis."

"Weekly," Chase corrected, and set down his crossword puzzle. This argument of theirs was ruining his concentration. He got up from his seat by the table, where a rather bored Foreman was deliberately ignoring the conversation by burying his nose further in his newspaper, and walked to the coffee maker to pour himself another mug of the caffeine brew — only to find it entirely empty.

Chase peered inside the coffee pot. "You drank it all?"

"I was supposed to leave some in the cup?" House asked in mock surprise.

The other man just rolled his eyes. "Faster if I get some from the cafeteria downstairs." He started toward the conference room doorway, knowing that House – especially post-hangover House – wasn't going to stop him. There were advantages to working for a guy who avoided work as much as possible, and Chase estimated this last case's paycheck should last them till the end of the week, which meant a good five days of early breaks and dinner parties to look forward to.

Seeing that House was very much hung over and not in the mood for company, Foreman decided that this was his cue to leave as well. "I could use some, too."

House turned to his remaining staff member. "Which leaves the mail sorting to..."

"You," Cameron replied brightly and followed the others out the door.

_...Damn. This is why he needed higher turnover rates._

With a sigh of resignation, House settled back once more into his chair and placed his cane on the desk, gazing thoughtfully at the tall pile of envelopes in front of him. He _could_ sweep it all into the trash. Could, and almost always did, except in this case, he was actually expecting something of importance in the mail for once. The fourth annual monster truck jam sweepstakes. A chance to ride Gravedigger in person. Considering that he'd rigged the drawing's outcome through several surefire methods (not the least of which involved posing as a competitor's wife), the tickets should be arriving just about this time this week…in a plain envelope completely indistinguishable from the usual dreck that clogged his inbox.

Hm. A real pain. He should've opted for the electronic alert instead, since his e-mail was set to auto-block all incoming messages except those containing the words 'porn' and 'Swedish babes.'

House picked up the stack of letters and started sifting them rapidly into the trash can by sight. Advertisements. Hate mail. Catwoman doc wanted help on another rash case. If anyone were really desperate enough to seek his medical opinion, they would've come in personally to be turned down and mocked in his presence, rather than relying on flimsy pieces of typewritten paper. He had little time to waste on cases that weren't urgent.

Dropping off the last of the letters, he sighed and leaned back against the table, one hand tugging at the blinds to his window so he could get some much needed rest. His arm brushed against a stray envelope on its way back. House frowned. Must've missed one. He flicked a quick glance at it before tossing it in the trash.

And then it hit him.

The envelope had no return address.

House opened his eyes partway and stared at the ceiling. That couldn't be right. All consult letters had to have a return address. They were impossible to process otherwise. The doctors he'd worked with could be stupid, true, hurried and clumsy and obtuse, but their secretaries never forgot to affix a neat little address label on every one of their outgoing mail. To do otherwise was to invite a visit from the red tape brigade, and _that_ was an administrative nightmare not even Cuddy would touch.

Cursing internally at his overactive mind – brains were great for medical puzzles, not so much for falling asleep – House bent over and fished the envelope out of the trash, tearing raggedly through the paper with one fingernail. This was going to be a consult, some dull fluff job or perhaps a med student seeking his advice on diagnosing the common flu. Damn Cuddy for posting his address in that lecture intro…

He held the letter up to the light so he could read. Blinked. Squinted at the sender's name. Scanned it several times again before turning in his seat to face the desk once more, finger tapping his cane thoughtfully.

Well. This was certainly the first time a patient had written without using a permutation of the words 'doctor,' 'House,' and 'asshole' in the first sentence.

He picked up the phone and began to dial.

--o--

It wasn't a long lineup, of course — not many wanted to drop their pants, even to save their lives — but it was still a lineup.

The head of oncology, regulated to testicular cancer exams. While nursing a hangover, no less. Though technically, he had no right to complain, having agreed to do his fellow coworker a favour.

Wilson took the patient's chart — a Mr. John Kinner — and was about to lead the forty-something, partially balding man into the exam room when an all too familiar voice cut clearly through the air.

"Hey, Wilson! I need you to check my balls!"

The murmur of voices from the waiting patients immediately died down.

Wilson froze for a split second, his hand on the doorknob. He offered Mr. Kinner, who was staring in slight bewilderment, a reassuring smile. "Sorry, the patients in the psych ward are prone to wandering."

Mr. Kinner nodded his sympathetic understanding. Wilson motioned towards the back of the line. "Excuse me while I...help him back to his room."

He slipped past the patients, chart still in hand, and made his way to where House was waiting at the back. There was a neat little space around him where people had edged away.

"They got you doing testicular exams?" House asked as Wilson grabbed him by the elbow and led him away from the public eye. "Wow, Cuddy must've been really pissed off."

Wilson exhaled loudly. "Dr. McKay had a family emergency. I'm filling in for him. Some people actually _do favours_ for others," he added.

"Really?" House asked, his voice dripping with his usual sarcasm. "Sounds like a complicated system. Do they give out little notepads to keep score?"

"Gold stars and all," Wilson replied, deadpan. He automatically followed as House limped off, apparently searching for an empty exam room to hide in by the way he was peering at each closed door. Finally finding one, they stepped inside. House hopped onto the examination table and planted the cane between his legs, chin resting on the wooden curve.

Wilson rubbed his temple. He'd been swallowing Advil since morning, feeling very much like his pill-popping friend each time. His headache should've at least edged off by now, but it was still going strong. Apparently, his hangover was worse than he'd thought, considering the wave of dizziness that had hit him just a bit earlier, too.

"So what did you drag me away from work for this time?" he asked, shutting the door behind him.

House gave a casual shrug. "My motorcycle broke, I need a replacement."

Wilson blinked. "You want me to fix your motorcycle?" he asked doubtfully.

"Well, it's either that, or my third leg."

_Third...leg?_

Wilson shifted his gaze to the perfectly intact wooden cane, not entirely sure what House was referring to. Well, unless — no. Never mind. Best not to go there at all.

House only smirked. "Speaking of which, got any advice on blackmailing Cuddy?"

"You hauled me all the way down here to ask me about blackmailing Cuddy?" Wilson asked. _Why am I not surprised?_ "What crazy thing are you looking to bail out of this time?"

"Nothing." House put on his best innocent look. "Why, do I need a reason to blackmail my boss?"

"Because then it wouldn't be blackmail," Wilson replied. "It would be snooping. Or you being you."

"I am _always_ me being me…except when me is actually you trying to convince me that I am not me while maintaining your facade as you." There was a moment of complete silence. "That wasn't me speaking, by the way," he added as an afterthought.

"Of course it wasn't." Wilson cleared his throat, arms folded across his chest. "Well, depending on what this is all even about, your blackmail source may vary greatly. What _are_ you planning?"

House gestured vaguely at the air. "A business maneuver." He tried to come up with a detail that would give his answer more credibility. "...Of sorts."

"Right," Wilson said skeptically. "And how disagreeable will Cuddy be once she hears of this business maneuver?"

House pondered. "That would depend on her tolerance for horizontal maneuvering."

"Horizontal," Wilson repeated blankly. "You...want her to let you go forward somewhere?"

"Technically — " House gave his cane a twirl and pointed it towards the floor. " — downward."

Wilson grew even more confused. "Down is a vertical direction."

"Not if you do it butterfly style."

_...Oh._

Oh. Sex. Sex, favour from Cuddy, and going somewhere. Clearly not an ethical issue, which could only mean —

"You're going on vacation?" he hazarded a guess.

House's self-satisfied smile confirmed it. "Orlando, here we come."

Wilson raised his eyebrows. "You want _me_ to dig out Cuddy's dirty secrets so you can officially take a vacation for once instead of just going AWOL? I don't even know any!" he protested. _And that aside, I'm most certainly not getting involved in this._

"Come on, she invited you out a date. No one goes out on a date without first sifting through their partner's dirty laundry," House pointed out.

"That could hardly be called a date." Julie admitting she'd had an affair had been less awkward. Maybe because the whole situation had been so familiar to him by that point. Dinner with his boss, however, was very _not_ familiar.

"It was still dinner. I know you have something I can use." House cocked his head. "Or are you just mad that I didn't invite you to come along?" he asked in a false-injured tone, fake puppy dog eyes turned on his friend.

Wilson raised his eyes to the ceiling in exasperation. "Again, why are you bothering to let Cuddy know? You usually just disappear whenever you feel like it."

"Not out of state."

Wilson frowned. "What's the difference? You're still not doing your job either way."

"It's different."

"It is." The words were filled with doubt. House obviously had something other than a vacation in mind, though Wilson couldn't possibly imagine what.

"Just because _you_ don't see it doesn't mean others don't. Pretty sure a person being eaten by a crocodile can't tell that it's really an alligator, but crickey," House said, pronouncing the word in a horribly exaggerated Australian accent, "I bet Chase's long lost cousin Steve could."

There was a resigned sigh. House could dance around the subject for an absurdly long time if he didn't feel like confessing, which was a bit strange for someone who was normally so brutally blunt, and even Wilson didn't have the patience for it. Especially not with a lineup of patients still waiting just down the hallway.

"Well, if you must, may I suggest you use blackmail's less destructive relative, bargaining? Convince her you'll be, I don't know, helping the hospital. Somehow."

"That's your job. I'm just the administration's poster boy."

"Yes, you certainly represent all that this hospital stands for," Wilson remarked. "Ethics, bedside manner, a desire to help the community — "

"Saving lives..."

_Touché_. That did happen to be House's unlimited Get-Out-Of-Jail-Free card. Actually, it was his only card.

Wilson scratched the back of his head. "If you're really going to Florida," he said finally, "I suppose it might help you to know that the Orlando Regional Medical Center is in the run with us for a very large donation."

House gave a quick side glance. "Cash?"

"I imagine there are both bills and cheques involved."

"Profit?"

"It's for pharmaceutical research," Wilson replied. "Not a business investment."

House tapped an index finger against his cane thoughtfully. "Cuddy's friend?"

"I suppose. Though now that I think about it," Wilson added almost to himself, "she hasn't been fighting for the money as hard as she could be..."

House's eyebrow arched in interest. The cane twirled expertly in his hands as a sly expression slowly crossed his face. "Hmm..." He stood abruptly.

Wilson blinked, arms dropping to his side. "What, that helped?" he asked, startled, trying to find some deeper significance in what he just said. All he'd revealed was that Cuddy didn't seem to want to the donation as much. That was odd, sure, but not useful. Right?

"What did I say?"

House was already halfway out the entrance. "The key to all of Cuddy's dating woes." The door swung shut, leaving Wilson not very informed and a little worried.

Then again, he'd probably find out soon enough. The nurses gossiped, and so did House's staff. Especially Chase.

The exam room door clicked shut for a second time. Wilson flashed an automatic smile to a passing nurse and contemplated another Advil, but decided to just ride out his headache with what was already in his system. If it wasn't gone in another hour or so...

Well. He'd worry about it then.

--o--

The waiting area in the clinic was getting even fuller than usual — every seat was filled, and then some — with most people exhibiting what Cameron immediately pegged as flu symptoms. _Symptoms_ because there was, of course, that chance that they didn't really have the flu. Two wailing babies in the corner (the first one had set off the second) topped off all of the patient chatter, making it nearly impossible to think.

She picked up her chart from where she'd been writing upon the front desk counter and turned to go find a more peaceful place, only to plow straight into what she assumed was an oncoming patient. She gave a small yelp of surprise as her heart jumped.

"Sorry! I didn't see — Oh, hey." She smiled in greeting. "Foreman." She glanced to his left. "Chase."

It was rare for all three of them to end up in the clinic at the same time. At the moment, though, not only did they have zero cases on their hands, but the size of the waiting room meant Cuddy had asked them to pick up some extra hours as well. Well, maybe not _all_ — there had likely been no asking involved when it came to House. 

Foreman lifted his folder in a partial wave to Cameron, still snickering over something. It probably involved Chase, given the other's utterly annoyed expression, his blue eyes rolled to the ceiling as though searching for some saviour within the fluorescent lights.

Cameron glanced from one to the other quizzically, smiling a little in confusion. "What's so funny?"

The answer came immediately from Chase. "_Nothing_." He dropped his file into the outbox and started for the door. "Can we go now?"

Foreman's snickering ceased, but his look of amusement remained. "Yeah." He tapped Cameron on the arm with the back of his hand. "Lunch. You want to come?"

"Sure. Just give me a second." She finished scribbling on her chart and tucked it away. "So is one of you going to tell me what's going on?" she asked as the clinic doors slid open, letting them out, and a mother of two young, sniffling children in.

"Someone of questionable gender found Chase pretty," Foreman replied.

Cameron laughed. "What, was this the Alice in Wonderland guy again?" That particular patient had had an eye on Chase even while a neurological condition caused the doctor to appear to be as small as a mouse. Hence, Alice in Wonderland syndrome.

"No, but something tells me that this one probably likes to dress up as Alice," Foreman said.

Chase rolled his eyes, hands in his pockets as he walked. "You know, next time, I'm locking the damn door so you don't keep bursting in on a whim."

Foreman chuckled. "You do that. And next time, I'll try not to interrupt your flirting session."

Chase shot his colleague a withering glare.

Cameron stepped inside the cafeteria. "Hope they're not serving the chicken from last time," she said, trying to prevent the sniping between the two doctors from escalating further.

It seemed to work, as Foreman shook his head. "And they say we're supposed to be worried about avian flu."

"Maybe not avian flu, but there are a lot of your good, old, regular influenza cases lately," Cameron said. It was a bit odd because she remembered hearing a couple of months prior that the flu this season was strong, though nothing particularly nasty. The story had all but changed now, with news headlines sending out continuous warnings, and there was definite proof of this by the amount of people dropping into the clinic. "I think I sent off a total of six cases today."

Foreman snorted. "Yeah, and one of mine asked if drinking alkaline water could make you immune to the flu."

"Well, we'll be encountering lots more of those cases," Chase said, peering at his watch. "And I was hoping for a short work day."

Cameron glanced at him. "Trying to sneak out early before House recovers from his hangover?"

"Only you wouldn't be. It's a perfect opportunity. Probably lots of people in the oncology department doing the same thing, what with both House _and_ Wilson wasted."

Foreman slid his tray along the line. "He went with Wilson?"

"Who else? House only ever goes anywhere with Dr. Wilson."

Cameron shrugged. "Most likely invited him out for a drink to make up." She paused to pick up a fruit salad. "I think it's kind of nice."

Chase let out a short, mocking laugh. "Are you getting visuals of them holding hands over a bottle of wine in your mind or something?"

"What? No!" Cameron insisted. "I just think it's nice that House was able to swallow his pride for once and genuinely apologize to someone for something he did."

She watched as Foreman and Chase exchanged a _she's hopeless_ look. Cameron shook her head, annoyed.

"I'll bet you anything he made Wilson pick up the tab," Foreman said.

"Or they could have split it," Cameron pointed out.

Chase gave her another look. "Put some money on it, and next time they go out drinking, we'll send you along with a camera."

"I'm not spying on two department heads just to win a bet."

Chase arched an eyebrow challengingly. "That's because you know you'll lose."

Cameron only rolled her eyes and picked a handful of fries off of Chase's tray.

--o--

It was a well-known fact that Cuddy was one of the few people in this hospital – indeed, in all New Jersey hospitals – who was capable of extracting information from the CDC without completely losing their mind. There was no special talent to it (though seven years of battling House certainly helped) and no medical school course that dealt with the matter (The Art of Business Negotiations was the closest she'd come), though some had tried to synthesize the knowledge of past generations into helpful how-to books for the first time administrator. Invariably, these syntheses failed.

It was always the paperwork that did them in.

Cuddy sifted rapidly through a stack of manila folders, phone balanced on one shoulder, as she searched for the one containing this month's updated admittance projection charts. "Yes, according to our records, there has been a steady increase in influenza cases in the past several weeks." A pause. "Yes, we have been taking prophylactic measures." Another pause. "Vaccinations, too. But the present supply is dwindling, and I'm sure the CDC is well aware that if current trends continue, we won't be able to cover the costs alone."

"Uh huh, right. Right." She nodded slowly. "Well, we're doing the best that we can. There are ten doctors at all times in the – " She had to bite her lip to stifle a retort to the obviously patronizing question that came next. "I know, and it's very possible."

There was a long string of bureaucratic jargon, followed by some shuffling on the other line and the inevitable orders from the CDC. Cuddy sighed. "I'll send out the advisory immediately. Alright. Good-bye."

She hadn't put the phone down for more than one second before House came bursting through the door.

"Need you to sign some paperwork."

Cuddy barely paused in her desktop rifling. "What'd you do, hit another patient?" She picked up the paper that House offered her automatically, skimming its contents with a disinterested eye.

"I have kindly filled out the name, date, and purpose of the visit," House pointed out helpfully, as he handed a pen to his boss.

Cuddy gave the paper back to him with a false-friendly smile, not bothering to take the pen. "You don't do consults."

House shoved it back into one of her hands and the pen into the other. "I do now."

Cuddy placed both items down on the desk. "Either someone slipped something into your drink last night, or you stand to gain something personally from this. And I'm thinking it's a _very_ big gain for you to come all the way down here."

"An all-expenses paid vacation, in fact."

Cuddy arched an eyebrow. "House, if anything, you _owe_ the hospital vacation days." She pushed the form back towards him. "I'm not signing this until you convince me that what you will gain from this is at least equal to what I or this hospital will gain from you flying off to Florida."

House pretended to ponder for a moment. "…Less patient complaints from the clinic?"

Cuddy rolled her eyes. "You'll have to do better than that."

"Hm. Alright. How about...twenty million dollars?" With a flourish, he pulled out the hospital consult letter from his coat pocket, laying it out on the desk like some final trump card. It was slightly creased, a little stained from the pizza box that sat next to it in the trash can, but still held the official tri-cross logo verifying its authenticity in the top left-hand corner. House paced as he summarized the letter's contents. "Mr. Raymond Charles, leading entrepreneur, business mogul, and maker of those wonderful little pill poppers we call Tic Tacs is currently visiting the Orlando Regional Medical Center. For a fundraising event, presumably, though his large, ample pocketbook and travel guide to the Top 10 U.S. Hospitals in the region make me question his real financial intentions," House said, eyebrows drawn together in pretend-thought as he stopped in front of the desk. "I'll let you figure out the rest."

His boss gave the contents of the letter a more careful second reading. "So…you get a vacation away from the clinic to inflate your ego by showing off your diagnostic skills with a consult while impressing Raymond, and our pharmaceutical research gets a leg up on the potential twenty million." She looked up at House. "Very nice."

House beamed. "I aim to please."

"Of course, how could I forget," Cuddy muttered sardonically. She paused, pen poised over the paper, and narrowed her eyes. Something wasn't right here. "Who's the consult for?"

"A friend of the hospital's."

"Right. And this friend…why does he need the brilliant Dr. House again?" The ease of this whole affair sparked her suspicions; House's self-satisfied air ignited them. "Or more to the point, why are you so interested in this consult? There has to be something about the case that caught your eye other than the prospect of a free vacation."

House shrugged and answered elusively, "Five doctors and three specialists couldn't figure out what was wrong with him, obviously they require my genius as their guiding light. Why, do I need another reason besides sunny Floridian mojitos?"

Cuddy shook her pen slowly in his direction. "You offered a bargain five minutes after arriving in my office. You planned it out beforehand, which means you are _way_ more interested in this than you would be in a simple clinic-weather escape route." She leaned forward. "Give me one good reason why I should sign this with no suspicions whatsoever about your true motives."

"Twenty million dollars sounds good enough for me."

"Unless you going down there actually _loses_ me the twenty million," Cuddy responded. "Which is not all that absurd of a notion."

"True." House paused, eyes squinting at the ceiling in sarcastic deliberation. "I could just completely botch the diagnosis, kill a guy, and surrender my medical license all to stop you from getting back together with Mr. Sugar Daddy Ray."

Cuddy looked at him in disbelief. "Getting back together with _whom_? Are you insinuating I don't want you to go to Florida because you think I had some kind of a…_fling_ with the man?"

"Hey, I'm not the one who logs all her calls through The slightly startled look that earned him confirmed House's point. "The History button is a beautiful thing."

"I can't believe you went through my computer logs," Cuddy said, shaking her head in disbelief. "Actually, I can. You already track my period, after all." She dropped the paper onto her desk. The pen clattered. "In which case, you know that it is not a result of PMS when I tell you I am not signing this."

"Baby must be coming early this year."

Cuddy gave him a hard look, refusing even to acknowledge that quip.

"House," she stated firmly, "there is _no way_ you are getting on that plane."

--o--

House settled comfortably back into his cushy airplane seat, a pillow tucked behind his head.

"Your champagne, sir," the flight attendant said, smiling brightly, her ample bosom nearly spilling into House's lap as she leaned over.

House accepted the flute of champagne. "Thank you." He settled back comfortably in his seat.

Ah, the wonders of flying...well, okay, it wasn't first class, but business was still a far cry from the cattle class with its hysterical first-time flyers stroking left and right, wailing babies, and leg room that only Bashful or Sneezy would be comfortable in. Here, however, there was none of that. Just handheld DVD players, actual menus, and comfy leather seats that reclined nicely, although they unfortunately didn't lie flat. Considering this flight was completely free, though, even House couldn't find reason to nitpick at that detail.

God bless the man for sending him these tickets.

_And God bless Wilson for unwittingly giving me that fateful tidbit on Cuddy and Mr. Raymond, Billionaire ex-Boyfriend._

Yes, the whole scene in Cuddy's office had indeed been complete, unadulterated genius. The switched letters, the bargaining, pissing her off to make her more defensive, and then casually mentioning that she was refusing to let him go because gaining the money meant getting back in touch with Raymond, which would invoke all those terrible memories of a bad break-up — obviously, she was still harbouring a grudge.

And because Cuddy liked to prove herself right almost as much as House did, she'd signed the dotted line not long after.

Plus, the notion of twenty million dollars had seemed appetizing from the very beginning.

Smiling to himself, House dug out the letter to reread it, wondering if there was any detail he might've missed that would give him a clue as to what exactly this was all about. Maybe a phrase or a word...but there was nothing. It was worded in that formal false-personal tone of all consult letters. There was no highly secret message, certainly nothing worthy of _The Da Vinci Code._ The only thing of any significance, aside from the missing return address, was the hastily scribbled signature at the bottom. It was messy, but House had no trouble deciphering it:

Fletcher Stone.


	7. Chapter 6

**Title:** Pathology  
**Rating:** G  
**Pairing:** None  
**Description:** House's vacation down in Florida isn't quite as he'd expected it, when Fletcher brings along a patient with an unusual political bombshell of a secret. Meanwhile, the CDC catches wind of an anomaly in the seasonal flu.  
**Author's Note:** Sorry this took awhile. With classes starting up, neither of us have much time to dedicate to fic writing during the week, so output's going to be rather slow until Thanksgiving break. Chapter 7 is, however, almost finished since I wrote a few of the scenes out of order.

It was days like these that made him wish he were still working for the military.

Bureaucrats, civilian contractors, a desk job – even a highly influential one – approving papers rather than actual, in-depth field work. He didn't regret taking the position as head of the National Center for Infectious Diseases under CDC (it did offer a wider range of study, after all), but mundane things like grant proposals sure made him wish he were still working bioterror at the Department of Defense. North Korea and Syria. Tracking the Soviet weapons program. Twenty years of anthrax research and overseas military operations, much of which involved chasing pathogens that should have by all rights been eliminated with the BWC, had that impression on a person.

Of course, he'd still be doing it if the government hadn't decided to waste all his grueling research by selling out to the Iraqis.

"Get these reports faxed over to immunology immediately." Sam deposited the folder into the outbox on the corner of his desk and glanced up again, amid rapid paper-shuffling. "What's next?"

"You have a board meeting at eleven, an AIDS summit at two, and the EIS officers from Chicago will be arriving at exactly four-thirty this afternoon." His secretary ticked off the items precisely from the list on her clipboard. "Also, your ten o'clock is here."

There was a long silence as Sam tried to maintain his composure. "Martha, when I ask what's next, I don't mean what tasks of great importance do I have to accomplish within the scope of a twenty-four hour day. I mean, what's next!" he snapped.

Martha was unperturbed. "Shall I cancel your Morgellons conference then?"

"No. Just get me a cup of coffee."

"Of course, sir," his secretary responded with an ironic smile and exited through the door.

Sam sighed as his eyes returned once more to the slew of papers on his desktop. Too many things to deal with. Rubbing the bridge of his nose, he tried to steel himself for his ten o'clock appointment.

The Morgellons conference.

Of course. A conference about an imaginary disease that no one could define and nearly every single qualified doctor had dismissed promptly. Sufferers claimed it caused painful rashes, chronic lesions, and multicolored fibers that sprouted seemingly overnight from the surface of their skin, like alien roots intertwining of their own volition. Or, as Maria had put it oh so eloquently, delusional parasitosis and lint. Sam was tempted to hand each of them a bottle of _Johnson & Johnson_ and refer them to the farthest psychologist.

Ironically, he recalled Rutz's public statement to the press that they would go into this investigation – dedicate twelve of their best and brightest people – with an open mind. Rutz was speaking on behalf of the CDC, of course, and at that time there had been mounting pressure from several political sources to pick this thing up. Leitao's backers had quite a few K Street connections they were willing to exploit. Add to that the administration's decision to selectively ignore its failed AIDS initiative in Africa, and you got a wild goose hunt that sucked away merrily at the NCID's research funding, while the government's purse strings drew ever tighter with the languishing Iraq war.

Sam's patience had died a long time ago.

A light knock at the door drew him up from his brooding thoughts. A thin, sandy-haired man in khakis and a button-down shirt, slightly rumpled around the collar, stood at the entrance to his office, a manila folder under one arm. He blinked myopically at the mess that was Sam's desk, and gave a nervous cough. 

Tom Roskin, head of the Division of Viral Diseases.

"Sam, do you have a minute?"

"I have West Nile up north, avian flu to the east, and I just sent my secretary out to get me coffee at ten fucking AM in the morning." Sam sighed and sat back down in his chair. "Yeah, I'll give you five. What is it?"

"Some data we collected on the current U.S. H3N2 epidemiological pattern doesn't match up with conventional models." Walking forward, Tom opened up the folder in his hands and took out several papers. "The force of infection is shifted upwards, and mortality distribution's been unusually deviant even given heightened population variance." His eyebrows drew together as he handed over the graph, pen pointing at the circled areas. "There's focal peaks here and here where the targeted cohorts have risen in normally low-risk groups."

"So it's a more virulent strain." Sam glanced over the data quickly, searching for any signs of an abrupt protein mutation. He found none. "The figures are still within the established margin of error for a general drift." Shrugging, he handed the papers back. "Why are you on this, anyway? I thought you were working in Special Pathogens with Victor."

Although Tom was technically the division head, he still spent most of his time in his old offices near the Biosafety Level 4 labs, conducting delicate experiments on emerging infectious diseases. His most recent studies were in H5N1 characterization, the most deadly form of avian flu, following a two-year stint with the Department of Agriculture during which he worked heavily on the sequencing of the 1918 influenza virus. Just recently, however, he'd announced that he was returning to his original field of study – viral hemorrhagic fever – to pursue an outbreak of Dengue in southern Africa. Tom would probably have been content to live the rest of his life in the laboratory (and the administration would've let him) if not for the unfortunate circumstances that saw the resignation of the former head of virology. A falling out with the CDC director, strained relations in DC, strapped funding – all of these combined to elevate the most non-political figure in their arsenal to the vacated position…and you really didn't get much more non-political than Tom.

"Too much field work, not enough analysis. Data collection's terrible." Tom shook his head irritably, one hand waving in the air as if to bat aside all manner of frivolous logistics. "Have you ever tried to discern stable control groups from a segment of sub-Saharan Africa?" he asked with frustration. "Victor couldn't tell a needle from a haystack if it hit him in the face!"

Sam snorted at the mix of aphorisms, a brief smile crossing his lips. Mutilated proverbs were yet another eccentric habit of Tom's. Probably why they never let him do press conferences.

"The point is," Tom continued, eyes squinting gravely as he pushed at his nonexistent glasses (he had yet to get used to his new contacts), "this raises the probability of a re-assortment this season."

"We've already sent out a health warning, what else do you want me to do?" He regretted asking almost immediately.

"Get the EIS down in Florida." Tom was already pulling out another chart. "Orlando, at least. Collect some samples, track some data, and then have the WHO run a full antigenic characterization – "

"Tom…"

"Characterization of the virus." Stopping, the other man frowned seriously. "It could be an epidemic, Sam. It could be 1918 all over again!"

"Or it could be just a seasonal drift." Sam rolled his eyes mentally at the other's borderline hysteria. It was an ill-kept secret that Tom Roskin – _the_ Tom Roskin, who did his Nobel Prize-winning work on lethal, contagious, highly virulent VHF pathogens – was actually a secret hypochondriac. "Look, I'll forward it on to epidemiology and have them take a look, but until there's something definitive, I'm not getting the WHO involved." With a flick of his wrist, Sam tossed the folder of flu data onto his desk, somewhere between the inbox and his empty coffee mug. "Right now, I've got a roomful of Morgellons experts who think that psychosis is communicable."

_And prove it by their existence,_ he thought sardonically to himself.

"Sam," Tom spoke in earnest as his boss made quickly for the door. His eyes belied a flicker of apprehension. "This could be serious."

Sam paused a split second before continuing, his response a barely audible mutter.

"Everything is."

--o--

"So you're saying this contact—" House automatically took his cane from where it leaned against the glove compartment as Fletcher's little Honda Civic slid into an underground parking space. "—has information you can't obtain anywhere else?"

"Essentially. Sources rarely have twins." Fletcher killed the engine, the keys jingling in the ignition.

House slid out of the car, cane-first. The problem with sitting on the passenger side was that he had to get out using his right leg. "You never know with these Russian agents." He slammed the door shut and moved to fall into pace beside Fletcher. A pair of headlights shone as a silver sedan drove past them.

"What's so important that you brought me down to Florida to conspire about? Couldn't be the malaria," he mused as he limped by a letter-number-and-colour-coded cement pole. Utterly useless, those things, when it came to locating your vehicle. "Foreman was in charge when they screwed up your case."

"I lost touch with my source awhile back. I thought he got cold feet, but it turns out he really can't say anything." Fletcher cast a slightly ironic glance at House. "You cured me when I had trouble talking. I thought maybe you could do it again."

"Trouble talking isn't the same as not talking at all. Either this guy can't tell the difference between reality and hallucination...or you dialled the wrong number for Jack Bauer."

There was a dry chuckle. "No, this is medical." The hospital doors slid open, revealing an unusual amount of bustling and patients, even for a hospital. Princeton-Plainsboro wasn't the only one getting hit hard with the flu season, apparently.

"I finally found him here after he disappeared," Fletcher went on, heading for the elevator. A nurse brushed past them on her way out as they stepped inside. "Plenty of docs, no results. They've stopped trying to diagnose him and gave him anywhere from a few hours to a couple of days to live. That's where you come in."

"You want me to diagnose your whistleblower so you can finish writing your next espionage book. Hmm." House cocked his head. This was starting to feel like a bad film noir rip-off. Then again, Fletcher was a journalist, and writers always upped the drama in everything. "Alright, where's his chart?"

"Therein lies a minor obstacle." Fletcher glanced at House. "You're technically not here on an official consult, so we'll need to swipe the medical records. Fortunately, being passed off as a terminal and hopeless patient means he doesn't have that many people attending to him, especially when they're busy with the flu season here."

"Unethical _and_ illegal," House remarked, following Fletcher into a room at the end of the hallway. "I like it. The good news is though..." He plucked the chart from the foot of the patient's bed and waved it with a flourish, not bothering to glance at the patient himself yet. "Most doctors keep their patient charts at the foot of the hospital bed when they've got other cases to attend to. Hence, less trouble for us."

He cast an eye at the patient. Mid- to late-forties, dirty blond hair, turning purple under the skin. Bleeding? Interesting...maybe he had the bubonic plague. He, who went by the name of...

"John Doe?" House flipped the chart over as though it would reveal a more legitimate name. "You don't know this guy's name?" Not that it was particularly important; House rarely ever used names, especially correct ones, when dealing with cases. But it was just nice to know that one was there should he ever happen to need it. A bit like having cash in his wallet even though he was out with Wilson.

Fletcher shook his head. "Triple I gave no name. Though I imagine it's Russian." He peered briefly at the John Doe.

House followed in suit, eyebrows drawn together. "Am I missing a third eye?"

"Ivanov Ivan Ivanovich. Russian equivalent of John Doe, just not as concise."

House tuned out the explanation (figures that eccentric journalists would make eccentric references), instead going through the chart. Admitted with a fever, heavy cough, nausea, extreme fatigue.

_Sounds familiar,_ he thought wryly. Not that he was all that surprised—a wide number of diseases began with all of those indications.

The usual repertoire of flu-like symptoms was followed by internal bleeding, despite a treatment of antibiotics and Interferon. House looked at the patient again. Not the bubonic plague, despite what it looked like. Streptomycin and tetracyclines were both used, to no effect.

A resistant strain, perhaps? There was one such case in Madagascar about ten years ago, but—nope. Not the plague. These doctors had actually had time to both bother with and complete a sputum and blood culture.

Damn. He had to find something to write on. Where was a whiteboard when you needed it?

He really should consider buying a portable one. Then again, he didn't do differentials on the go all that much, ever since the last "consult" trip to Las Vegas (for some reason, Cuddy didn't believe the really-expensive-procedures excuse).

"I think I'll go do what I'm good at and leave you to your specialty." Fletcher's voice broke suddenly into House's thoughts. He glanced up from where he was staring at the chart in time to catch a flying lab coat.

"Put this on," Fletcher said, starting for the door. "You'll need it undercover."

House watched the door click shut before draping the white coat over the bedrail.

Writing on the walls with a pencil instead of a marker would be considered low profile, right?

--o--

Navigating the little Honda civic with one hand, Fletcher juggled the laptop in the passenger seat beside him with the other. The cell phone was put on speaker. He had his address book balanced on the dashboard. On a scale of 1 to 10, this probably rated a negative in the marks of safe driving, but his limited amount of time made any other way infeasible. Besides, he was steering exceptionally slow along a tiny strip of road with literally no other cars in sight. Unfortunately, there was also a disturbing lack of streetlights, but he'd take what he could get.

"Come on, Dale, tell me you can glean something from all that stuff I gave you," he said, eyes flicking back and forth from the road to the softly glowing laptop screen.

"All that stuff?" the man on the other line echoed. "You gave me exactly one miniscule photo and a driver's license."

"You realize what I had to go through to get them, right?"

"Yeah, yeah, it was torturous, I know," Dale replied glibly. The click-clacking of a keyboard could be heard through the phone. "I can't say yet. It's not like I can run this through a database using face recognition. Maybe you should call CIA or something. That new super secret thing, CTU?"

"Sure. Investigative journalists and the government. Like peanut butter and garlic."

There was a moment of silence as the ex-college student slash expert hacker slash wannabe neo-Marxist returned to his work. Fletcher attempted to keep on driving while trying to decipher an old news article on his laptop using his rusty knowledge of Russian. He'd managed to pick up the language during his three-month journalistic stint in Leningrad (he still had trouble remembering it was St. Petersburg now) following leads on one of his earlier major stories. A real government coup, lots of juicy politics. Almost made up for his translator's hasty exit following the fourth death threat. Of course, most of that language centered on a re-interpretation of the Communist Manifesto, so he was having a little difficulty reading up on current events…

A narrow swerve around a bend let him know that this excessive multi-tasking wasn't going to work out. He finally pulled over and shut off the engine, still waiting for Dale to come back on the line.

Dale Lamden was one of his strongest assets at the moment. Though he could squirrel out the faintest leads in government corridors, Fletcher didn't quite have enough technical expertise to open up those backdoors into certain electronic files. That's where Dale came in. He'd met the kid early on in his career while hunting for a reference in the Library of Congress, some final link in his investigation of Oren, Inc, a big oil company with a distinct lack of corporate ethics. Or human ethics, for that matter. Dale hadn't needed any provocation to go into a rant about the capitalist regime, but he was skeptical when Fletcher replied offhandedly that things would change within the next few days. That skepticism changed a week later when the indictments came down and half of Oren's top brass bailed out to the Cayman Islands. From then on, Dale had become a loyal accomplice in all things investigative, and despite a couple of minor twists and snarls (he wasn't particularly keen on giving up his comrades in the IWW), Fletcher came to trust him for anything that involved computers.

"Don't you have a name for me, at least?" Dale asked. " 'Cause I'm pretty sure the one on his ID isn't the real deal."

"No name. He's a John Doe right now. Although…wait." Fletcher's eye had just caught a corner of a yellowed envelope sticking out from underneath the laptop. He reached over quickly and pulled out the letter within, searching through the mass of Russian characters for something he could use. This was the one letter that happened to _not_ address its recipient by name, but halfway down the letter, there was something there: "our mother."

His eyes immediately skipped down to the signature at the bottom. This one was a little harder to decode, but he managed after a minute or so. "Tamara Dmitriyevna Sokolova."

"He's a she now?" Dale asked, sounding half-serious.

"Good guess, but no. She's his sister, I think. Since she's probably not using a pseudonym, I think we can assume that his name's got 'Dmitriyevich Sokolov' somewhere in there."

_God bless the Russian naming system._

"You know, you could've mentioned that earlier," said Dale. "Now how the hell do you spell that?"

Fletcher gave it to him first in English, and with a little more difficulty, managed to convey the Russian spelling, as well. "Look, if you get anything, email me," he said, starting up the car's engine again. "I'll be calling the bureaucrats."

"Sure thing. Have fun, man." There was an audible _click._

Abandoning his Internet search, Fletcher flipped his laptop shut and turned onto one of the main Orlando streets, dialling a series of numbers with his thumb. It was late in the evening, but he was pretty sure the man he was looking for was still in his office at the Defense Intelligence Analysis Center, and would be until late into the night.

A sleepy-sounding secretary put him on hold for a full five minutes before transferring him through.

"Evans," came the clipped greeting.

"Evening, Jeff. It's Fletcher."

"Oh?" Jeff Evans said. "It's been awhile since I've heard from you. What're you delving into this time?"

"Nothing that'll get you fired," Fletcher said, before getting down to business. "Listen, I wanted to ask you a few things."

"Go ahead. As long as we're on the same old terms."

"Cite you only as 'an employee of the Defense Intelligence Agency, bracket, DIA, close bracket,'" Fletcher recited.

"That's the one."

Fletcher flipped through several pages of scribbled notes, searching for material to start off with. He wanted to begin slowly and work his way up. Cover-ups weren't something the government was willing to expose. What made this a bit more difficult was that he didn't even know what the cover-up was _of_ at the moment.

"How long did you work for CIA before you transferred, again? Eight years?"

"Nine, but close enough."

"And you started in '77?"

"Yeah. I was Chief of Station, Moscow, blew my cover in '86, and hopped directly over to the DIA. You already know all this." Jeff didn't sound suspicious, exactly, but his tone was slightly wary.

"Just confirming," Fletcher said, barely stopping at a red light in time. The car lurched. "My memory's never that good. That's why I'm in a profession of writing everything down."

Jeff laughed.

"Who took your place after the Soviets shipped you back to Uncle Sam?" Fletcher asked.

"Sorry, can't say. They're still hopping around as Station Chief in various locales. One of the lucky ones," Jeff added, referring to the cuts made to the CIA following the end of the world game of nuclear chicken. Although things were starting to look up significantly again.

"You sure you can't give me a clue?" nudged Fletcher. He actually wasn't interested in an answer. He'd already known Jeff wouldn't divulge the information, and it wasn't even something he needed. He'd just learned from experience that people tended to tell him things he _did_ want to know if they'd already turned him down once or twice prior.

"Wish I could," Jeff said. "But knowing him, he wouldn't go near a journalist even if you did track him down."

"Guess that leaves you as my sole source, then." Fletcher paused a moment, hunting for the right question to ask. He didn't have time to dance around until he found the correct trigger.

"Did you have any Russians who actually came to America when they defected while still undercover?"

"Sure. A few Russian diplomats who were supposed to be gathering American intelligence for the KGB ended up handing over information to the CIA instead."

"Did they ever hand anything else over?"

"If you're talking about actual weapons or something, no. Diplomats — hell, not even some of the higher ranking officials — wouldn't have gotten their hands on that in their own country, much less taken it across the Atlantic."

A mechanic beep sounded. Fletcher glanced over at his laptop and, taking advantage of the current red light, quickly opened up his email.

_That was fast._

Dale hadn't pulled up very much, but he did manage to get a full name and a few haphazard bits of history, including...

_Interesting._ Nikolai Dmitriyevich Sokolov, a.k.a. Triple I, had apparently been living in the U.S. for roughly twenty years now.

Fletcher glanced back at the road. "Aside from the KGB, who else attempted to infiltrate the U.S.?"

"Well, for the most part, everyone was KGB, but there were a few guys who were pulled from the military for whatever reason to work for the KGB. My bet is that those they pulled from the military were a bit on the expendable side."

"You mean, they went in without diplomatic immunity?"

"That would be correct," Jeff said. "You can't throw everyone into the embassy, and all diplomats are closely watched. So to get freer access, you'd send in a few very deep sleepers. These guys are good. At worst, they passed as second-generation Russians. At best, they slid seamlessly in as other East Europeans or even real Americans. Little to no accent."

"And the defection rate...?"

"A little higher than average. When your cover's close to blowing and you've got no immunity, your best bet is to hand over information instead. Also — I mean, you've definitely got the loyal guys, but let's be honest here — American life was way more appealing than Russian life back in the day. A lot of them had kids they wanted to build a better future for. Defection's just another way of emigrating, really."

Fletcher frowned, thinking. He was getting a little closer. Still not good enough, though.

_Wonder how much info House is getting._

He considered trying a different angle, but decided to push forward once more. "So these sleepers, what kind of access did they get?" _Translation: What screw-ups did we do that a Russian could've gotten an eyeful of?_

"Some didn't get in very deep. Others went as far as to work for private weapons developers — nuclear, yes, but also other areas. Bio, missiles, various artillery. A couple became civilian technicians for government contractors, too."

Fletcher tuned him out after the mention of weapons. Yes, it was technically a _nuclear_ arms race, but at its core, it was just an arms race.

Nikolai had told Fletcher that he had access to files detailing _something_ — a "development" he had called it — but had never mentioned what that something was. What Fletcher did know was that the government didn't want civilian eyes laying on it. It was unlikely that it would be anything along the lines of the U.S. supporting a policy that the public wouldn't have approved of — Nikolai's exact word had been _development_. A situation would've already developed. That left an actual object.

And objects translated into weapons.

--o--

Nothing.

Four hours, a quarter of a pad of sticky notes, and five cups of coffee later, there was nothing.

Lab work had ruled out everything bacterial and fungal, as the patient had been here long enough for them to actually run those tests. And while House had never been one to trust results obtained by other doctors, he had no choice in this case. He technically was here illegally, so to speak, which meant he couldn't exactly go up to the lab and ask them to run another batch just for him.

Assuming the lab boys were correct, then, the dismissal of a bacterial infection—and the presence of a heavy cough—meant pharyngitis was scratched off the board. The viral version of it was too mild to even take into consideration—it only came along with any number of other viruses, influenza or herpes for example, and disappeared in a matter of three or four days. Pneumonic and bubonic plague were also out—no _y pestis_ on the gram stain; none for the blood culture.

And no viral infections fit perfectly into all of the symptoms. Not even two, for that matter—either the patient didn't have all the right puzzle pieces, or he had one extra. In fact, the only virus capable of causing symptoms as varied as this was influenza. Influenza A, specifically, the more destructive of its B and C counterparts.

But not _this_ destructive. For influenza to be this deadly, there would have to be more than just your standard annual mutation. And there was no way the flu could've experienced what the virology boys called an antigenic shift—a merging of one flu virus with another—without officials noticing. It may have managed to occur in 1918, but slow as the CDC was in most areas, they did work fast when it came to pandemics. Otherwise, both the public and the politicians would clamber all over them.

Besides, if it was an influenza virus, then why was no one else sick? Sure, there was a minor epidemic this year, with more people getting sick than usual, but nothing causing symptoms as extreme as this John Doe had.

_Unless this is just the beginning._

Now there was a pleasant thought. Maybe Wilson had been on to something after all with his attempts at Jewish-mothering House into getting vaccinated. That was a good several years back, though. Wilson had given up after House had suspiciously agreed to let Wilson give him the shot, and then attempted to swap the syringe with the vaccine for one loaded with morphine.

…That had been quite a night of diversions.

House shifted in the uncomfortable plastic, hospital-chic chair. He'd decided two hours ago to stuff the patient with as much interferon as possible in conjunction with oseltamivir, an antiviral with a decent success rate. Despite the tests coming up negative for bacterial, he threw in some levofloxacin just in case—a broad spectrum antibiotic wouldn't hurt things. Better than nothing, but he doubted it would work.

So far, his doubts were proving quite accurate.

The cane in his hand bounced steadily against the floor between his feet, creating a soft _thump_ each time it hit the ground, as he stared at the white wall before him. On it were about ten extra-large Post-It notes, each bright neon pink sheet containing a single symptom.

High fever (hundred and three). Productive cough. Delirium. Swelling (neck). Dizziness. Nausea. Respiratory symptoms. Respiratory arrest (once). Sudden loss of consciousness.

He'd started out rearranging them, first going from initial symptoms to the last, and then vice versa. When that yielded no results, he went from symptoms most likely to kill the patient to ones least likely to. Then alphabetically. Then from the least number of letters to the most.

Now they were arranged in a loose swirl design on the wall. He considered making another pattern – something more Picasso – but decided to give the patient a check instead. If he was lucky, maybe he would find something new to take into consideration, something that would open up the differential options a little more. Normally, he wanted it narrowed down, but this was a special case, where instead of having too many differentials, he had none.

"Oh, Happy Medium, why do you hide from me so?" he muttered semi-dramatically into the air, waving his cane expansively like a knight prepared to dive into battle with his sword.

The previously unresponsive patient grunted.

House immediately turned around a split second before the door cracked open.

Fletcher stepped into the room, glanced from the patient to House, and immediately lit up in an almost comical fashion. "You cured him?" he asked, shutting the door behind him.

"You have impeccable timing," House said. "And I suppose I did." He approached the bed, plucking a thermometer along the way and stuck it into the patient's mouth. John Doe was looking appropriately bewildered.

"At least, for now," House added, checking the temperature. Drop of two degrees.

"What did he have?"

House shrugged. "No idea."

Fletcher frowned. "But you cured him."

"If you insist on an answer, then he had either a fungus, bacteria, or virus, though I'm going with virus. In which case, he recovered on his own, with assistance of the cocktail of meds I jammed into his system, which technically had extremely low odds of working, making him one lucky man." House tossed the thermometer onto the side table. "One less thing to be depressed over, which the Russian will no doubt see as even more reason to be depressed."

"Who is this?" For the first time, the patient spoke up, albeit in slurred and heavily accented words. He was squinting suspiciously at House. Either that, or he was still adjusting to the light after days of drifting in and out of consciousness.

"I'm your savior," House said before Fletcher could make any formal introductions. "And since my saving's done, I'll be outside gloating to the other doctors who couldn't do it." He began limping out the door, knowing full well that if the patient wouldn't even offer a first name to Fletcher, he wouldn't be saying anything while a strange doctor with a cane hung around. Besides which, there were other ways to satisfy his curiosity without alerting anyone. House was trained in the department of stealth and eavesdropping, after all, having done so numerous times with Cuddy and Wilson in search for ammunition against both.

There was a moment of debate as he eyed the closed door, weighing his options of either standing by the hinges or on the other side. It was easier to remain hidden with the former, but that choice also came with the risk of getting his face smashed in should Fletcher happen to overzealously throw the door open in an eureka moment.

But he'd risk it.

House stood close to the crack, leaning against the wall and silently thanking the architect for not making them glass like the ones at Princeton-Plainsboro. His cane twirled smoothly in a wide arc as he strained to hear the quiet—not hushed, just quiet—conversation. Mostly one-sided, from Fletcher's end. The patient was too much on the mumbling side for him to make anything out, especially muffled as it was by the wooden door.

"...never managed to get them?" There was a long pause from Fletcher as he absorbed what House assumed was some variation of the answer, "No." Followed by heavy coughing.

The cough didn't sound like it was getting better. Temporary cure only? House still wasn't sure what it had been in that cocktail that had been effective.

"Maybe I can get them," Fletcher was saying. "Where are they? ...Uncle Sam's got a lot of bunkers, which one?"

The coughing became harsher, resembling that of a drowning man if someone underwater were actually capable of coughing. Fluid in the lungs wasn't getting any better. The next step down the Dying ladder was completed when the hacking abruptly stopped. And the beeping began.

House swung the door open again, nearly running into Fletcher, who had apparently been on his way out. "House! I thought you left."

"No, I said I'd be going outside," House replied, pushing past Fletcher and to the patient, whose lips were showing definite cyanotic discolouration. He didn't have to look at the nail beds to know that the same thing was occurring there as well.

_Yup, definitely only a temporary cure._

He made his way as quickly as possible to the intercom, cursing that his leg chose this moment to act up more than usual.

"Code Blue, room 452, Code Blue—ow!" Fletcher had grabbed his right elbow, causing him to put more weight than he should have on his leg, and sending his yelp of pain through the entire hospital via intercom.

"We gotta go now," Fletcher said, still tugging on House's arm, less forcefully this time, but enough so that House ended up limping after him out the door. "I don't want anyone tracing me back to a source."

As Fletcher practically manhandled him out the door, House caught sight of the pink Post-Its still stuck on the wall, as though Barbie had invaded and tried to do a paint job.

He didn't mention them, though, instead following closely beside Fletcher. One upside to calling the code was that everyone was too busy rushing through with the crash cart to notice a cripple and a journalist sneaking as discreetly as possible around a corner and into an elevator.

"Did you get what you needed?" House asked as the door slid shut.

Fletcher seemed to consider. "No. But I got something." He flipped thoughtfully through his notepad. "So are all those doctors going to be able to do something for him or is he gone?"

"Gone," House replied with no uncertainty. "Even if he were to survive, he wouldn't be alert anytime soon if at all."

Fletcher looked disappointed, but not surprised, as though he knew the answer, but had just been holding out hope. It was only then that something seemed to occur to him.

"What he had...was it contagious? Highly contagious, I mean?"

That was a good question. Worst case scenario said yes; some of the facts said no. This was the only death. No other similar case even came close. At least, not that he'd heard of.

Fletcher was still waiting for an answer.

House finally gave a shrug. "If it is, then it's too late to do much about it."

--o--

It wasn't a high-end, four-star hotel, but it wasn't a tiny, cramped motel crawling with cockroaches and peeled linoleum, either. Comfortable enough for a few days' stay. The carpet was a nice, light shade of cream, with a matching sofa around a maple wood table. The chambermaids had neatened the entire place, creating a room more spotless and tidy than the time Wilson's maid cleaned out House's apartment.

House had settled into one of the sofas for no more than fifteen minutes, twirling his cane lazily. In that time, Fletcher managed to completely destroy any semblance of order in the room.

Stacks of files now littered the bed, and scraps of crumpled paper with their half-written notes pooled the floor. Old newspaper clippings, several memory sticks and CDs, and a glowing laptop connected to a tangled cord from the charger in the wall completed the chaos. Fletcher was sitting bent over the computer.

Even House couldn't figure out exactly what the journalist was doing. Though any coma patient could estimate that he was hunting through sources to build some sort of story. Conspiracy story, no doubt.

House raised an eyebrow as a cigar was offered to him. "Thought you were more of a Marlboro kind of man."

"They were a gift."

"Well," House replied sardonically, "I always stick things people offer me for free into my mouth."

Fletcher chuckled wryly. "You're not gonna give me a doctorly lecture on the perils of smoking, are you?" He kept flipping through the papers in front of him, one hand poised over the keyboard. The laptop screen showed a dense window of shorthand notes, numbers, and key quotes interspersed with various references to an O.H. Wendell – pseudonym for an informant of his. Every once in awhile, Fletcher would enter another line of text. "My last source would take a puff on his inhaler every time I exhaled some smoke, and then proceed to rattle off lung cancer statistics like they were the next gospel. I had to remind him each meeting that that wasn't quite the controversial information I was looking for."

"Statistics are easy to twist, even more fun to make up." House reached into his coat pocket for a lighter to light his cigar with. "Best of all when they trot out the Darth Vader types with the tubes in their throats to scare the little children."

Fletcher paused, considering. "Would they be scared or would they think they've met a movie star?"

"Well, if you stick a bag over their heads, I'd say they could be both."

The other man gave a short laugh and shook his head. "Invite me the next time you have such a session. I want to see how it works."

"I'll talk to my buddy in oncology," House replied dryly. He gestured at the papers in front of him. "So these documents, they've got any of the guy's old medical records?"

Fletcher shook his head without looking up. "He's had injuries. Bullet wounds, the like. Some shrapnel that was removed fifteen years ago. No illnesses from what I've seen." Stopping, his eyes narrowed as he took a deep puff on his cigar and flipped the document he was looking at onto its back. The page was empty of any more information. Damn. "What did you manage to figure out after I left? Any theories as to what he has?"

House watched all this with detached interest, his eyes roving briefly over the manila folder on Fletcher's knee. He took a thoughtful drag off his cigar before lowering it and glancing out the thin-paned window, bright Orlando night lights sketching a gaudy pattern on the glass. He mused aloud half to himself. "All symptoms point toward the flu – high fever, inflamed lymph nodes, bouts of extreme cold. No evidence of bacterial or fungal infection. Pneumonia might fit a few signs, except end stage showed some internal bleeding." He stopped, and frowned. "Hemorrhaging." With a deft dart of the hand, House snagged the patient chart from its precarious place at the edge of the coffee table, eyes scanning quickly down until he found the section he was looking for. "Rapid onset hypovolemia."

…This put an entirely new spin on the differential. House frowned, trying to recall the last moments of the patient before he was summarily dragged out of the room. Heart rate spiked, definitely, BP took a veritable nosedive - neither was uncommon in a variety of terminal cases. But it might also be a sign of hemorrhagic fever...something like Dengue or Crimean, the dreaded bio-sci nightmare, Ebola. Extensive blood loss (though not as much as in the movies) and multi-system crashes were common in the final stages of the disease. Add in the high fever, delirium, and tendency of military officers to travel to exotic, godforsaken places, and you had a good case for VHF.

If only the antigen tests matched up.

Fletcher frowned, looking up from his own files thoughtfully. "If you have pneumonia and the flu, does that work together to cause hemorrhaging or is that just far too easy to be true?"

"Not likely. The only way you're going to get hemorrhaging at that far advanced is if you've got a scalpel shoved down your throat."

The other man cocked a shrewd eyebrow. "_That'd_ make for an interesting story." Turning back, he entered a few things from another document into his computer. "So aside from not being able to breath, you don't know what really killed him? Not that it matters, I suppose, given that it's too late to cure him." He chewed on the end of his cigar in frustration. "You know how close I am to getting a huge break? Just a few more questions would do it." Sighing, he leaned back and shoved the folder of papers aside. "You don't happen to be able to contact the dead, too, do you?"

"No, that would require a 40-yr-old hippie woman and a séance." House paused, glancing over at Fletcher's intense expression. "I do, however, know a few things about extracting useful information from dead paper. What's this story about?"

Fletcher opened his mouth as if to deliver the standard reporter's line about a developing story, before thinking better of it given the scattered pile of documents his consultant was currently paging through. "Several months back, I caught wind of a cover-up. I figured it sounded like a good one, so I dug deeper." He rubbed pensively at his chin. "It seems the government is better at destroying papers than it is at what it actually creates. Triple I here said he had some files detailing something – a weapon, most likely – from the U.S. that fell into Russian hands. Kicker is, this transaction may not have been the most legal." House raised an eyebrow. "Or the most…Geneva-friendly. If this is true, then people might have better things to protest than the war in Iraq pretty soon."

"A conflict with Russia. World War III."

"And not a cold war, either. Bets are, the nukes come out and the world's gonna end." He paused, considering that for a byline. Shrugged. "But I'm only working on assumptions here. It might not be that dire."

"If it's anything as powerful as the virus that killed him, then I think we can all safely err on the side of worst scenario."

Fletcher stopped, worried. "Well, if it is, then nukes might not even be necessary." He turned to look at House. "On the other hand, if I find anything out for certain, I'll be sure to let you know so you can get in on all the girls and booze before you die."

"Thought you swore off the hard stuff except for rock 'n roll," House quipped wryly.

"I lied. It looks like you caught me." Fletcher shook his head and laughed. "Good thing you're a doctor and not a journalist though, or I'd actually have to talk to my lawyer."

Reporters and lawyers got along about as well as mongoose and cobras, which was to say, not very well. It didn't particularly help that just five years ago, he'd written an expose of a money-laundering operation at one of the larger law firms this side of K Street, leading to no less than fifteen arrests and two indictments in the subsequent investigation. Ever since, those suits at the bar association had hexed him with their version of the evil eye – interminable bureaucratic oversight.

Suddenly, he caught a keen word of interest in the sentence before him. "Think I have something..."

House snatched up the paper, immediately curious, and scanned its contents for relevant medical data. Instead, he came across a list of addresses. Vague addresses, to innocuous P.O. boxes in the middle of nowhere. Or perhaps somewhere…masquerading as nowhere…

Fletcher looked up at House as realization dawned upon the both of them. "Location is key to more than just business and real estate."

"Because the military has an investment in keeping its own secrets safe..."

"...Or hidden away where nobody can find it." Fletcher got up, already packing away his laptop and reporter's notepad, as he gave the table one last sweep. "You know, I don't know what would be better, if I'm right or if I'm wrong."

House's hand went immediately to his cane. "Where are you going?"

"I can't tell if the location's any good without taking a look around. You enjoy Orlando for a bit. Check out the bars, knock back some beer, meet some women." He paused briefly at the door, one hand on the knob, as the old investigator's glint returned to his eyes.

"If World War III starts up before I get back, you have my number."

--o--

The bright, glowing digits on the clock showed 2:41 A.M. when House was jolted rudely out of his half-awake doze on one of the comfortable sofas by a shrill ringing that no doubt penetrated the thin hotel walls. This was proven when House chose to let the thing keep ringing (in hopes that whoever it was would hang up) and was subjected to a loud pounding on the door not thirty seconds later.

"Turn that fucking thing off!" a deep voice snarled. "You know what time it is?"

"Give a cripple some time to get in motion!" House snapped back, as the ringing finally died away.

He heard footsteps as the man shuffled back to his room, an unintelligible curse floating back.

House leaned back against the cushion, his sleep schedule ruined. Now he'd have to wait thirty minutes or so before there was any chance of catching some shuteye again. Who'd call him in the middle of the night? Certainly not his team. They didn't have any cases, and their just-released patient was fine. Not Cuddy — she knew where he was. Wilson? Probably. Having moved back in meant he'd know if House was actually not home instead of going with the assumption that he just wasn't picking up the phone. Besides, Wilson had always had the tendency to worry (for the rest of society) when House vanished without a word.

The phone began ringing again. House groaned and finally hauled himself off the sofa, stumbling over to the bed where he'd tossed his overcoat. He sat down and dug through his pockets, first the right, and then the left, before coming up with the phone. He peered at the caller ID, expecting to see Wilson's number and instead getting one he didn't fully recognize.

_Fletcher?_ He hadn't given the journalist his number, but Fletcher had his ways of obtaining information.

House flipped open the cell at last, cutting off the shrill ringing midway. "You just interrupted a really nice dream I was having about Pamela Anderson."

The voice on the other line didn't even hesitate at the odd greeting. "It's Foreman. Our patient was just readmitted about five hours ago, said he got dizzy, and that his cough was coming back real strong. His fever spiked up to — "

"So give him some antibiotics," House snapped, his lack of attention causing him to miss Foreman's distinctive use of the past tense. "Make sure he's not lighting up any more of those incense sticks so soon after, either — "

"House — "

" — and tell him to drink more water, it's probably what's causing everything to spin around him like — "

"_House!_"

House rolled his eyes impatiently and shifted the phone to his other ear. "What?"

"Michael died thirty minutes ago."


	8. Chapter 7

**Title:** Pathology  
**Rating:** PG  
**Pairing:** None  
**Description:** Returning from Florida, House finally starts putting the pieces of the puzzle together, but Cuddy won't be convinced until some definite proof arrives. That proof, unfortunately, will come far graver than either of them could expect.  
**Author's Note:** Yay, back to Wilson 3. There'll be a lot more conversations between the two in the upcoming chapters, if I can ever get through the medical jargon.

A priest, a rabbi, and a Jehovah's Witness walked into an airport – it sounded like the beginning of a bad bar joke, except House was pretty sure he wasn't drunk yet. Drugged, maybe. But not drunk. Though at 2 AM, the difference seemed negligible.

Sighing, he tugged his deer hunter hat further down on his head and prayed that the Vicodin would kick in before the prolific woman's preaching drove him – as well as several other sleepy-eyed passengers – to the great, big loony bin in the sky. It was bad enough that he had to take the red eye back to Princeton, worse still when said red eye's boarding was delayed thanks to an electronic problem with the baggage check machine. But what God had he angered to deserve an accompaniment by the religious nutzoid version of the United Nations? At least the priest and the rabbi were wise enough not to recruit among a roomful of exhausted airline passengers. The Witnesses, on the other hand…

House shot a quick glance in her direction. Three persons down. Two, technically, because one of the guys was most definitely a Koran-thumping (did they thump their Korans or just wave them dramatically around?) Muslim, and even the JW's knew not to poke those with a stick. Maybe if he was lucky, airport maintenance would overcome their ineptness long enough to fix the baggage check before she threaded her way over here.

Except –

"Sir, would you like to live forever in a perfect paradise on Earth?"

Jehovah's Witnesses tended to travel in pairs.

House looked up slowly from his Cosmo magazine, and blinked. "I'm guessing…_that's_ a rhetorical question."

"If you accept Jesus Christ as your personal savior, you too can enter the kingdom of heaven at the appointed time of Armageddon," the young woman in front of him continued on earnestly. She settled into the seat across from him, dress folded primly, and balanced her stack of pamphlets on her lap.

"Yeah, but then I'd have to climb all those stairs." House reached over for his cane.

"Your spirit will transcend the physical to unite with our Lord above, where there is no suffering, no hunger, and – " She paused, solemnly. " – no _pain_." For a moment, the woman's eyes flicked over his leg, as House pushed himself up and snatched for his haphazard luggage. "Only the peaceful serenity of His eternal presence. All He asks of you is that you open up your soul to Him."

"Oh, really?" House began walking off at a rapid pace. "But see, I sold my soul to the anti-Christ, and all I got was this lousy cane. Any chance I can mortgage half for a refund?"

The Jehovah's Witness looked a bit perturbed, but quickly recovered her composure as she kept up a step behind him. "And why exactly were you trying to sell your soul?"

"Because if I sold my heart, then little Betty Lou would cry," House replied in a mock-whiny voice. He saw her reach for the bundle of pamphlets under her arm. "Before you finish, just answer me this." Abruptly, he turned to face her. "Why is God trying to cheat the IRS?"

The woman seemed confused. "I…beg your pardon?"

"Well, I'm sure 'Jenova' wasn't a typo." House poked a finger at the top page of the pamphlet in her hand.

The way she glanced down at it, startled, you would almost think that she'd actually seen a multi-tentacled, mutated freak.

House made good his getaway.

Several minutes later, he finally found his way back to the baggage check line, sans religious stalker. The other Jehovah's Witness, after failing to convince a Wall Street investment banker to give up his life of monetary gain in favor of one declaring the apocalypse every few years, seemed to have left as well. Perfect. House slipped alongside a drowsy mother of two, knowing full well that the woman wasn't about to stir up a protest at his line-hopping and risk the far graver threat of awakening her young, fidgety children.

Who said Early Childhood Development was a useless class?

In the interim of his escape, a steady progression of sleepy-eyed businessmen and travelers had built up in front of the bulky X-ray machine, all shuffling along silently as an equally bored security guard shoved their possessions through the conveyor belt. His partner by the metal detector went through the motions of waving the passengers through, all the while flicking one eye over at the clock on the far terminal wall. Clearly, all those heightened airport security measures had not yet extended to the graveyard shift crowd. House estimated that the flight delay would put him back in Princeton just in time to catch the morning patient rush – an unpleasant deluge of drunken frat bar casualties and random calls from incompetent clinic patients.

Speaking of which...House found himself replaying the conversation he'd had with Foreman earlier that night. The patient dead, seemingly out of nowhere, his symptoms almost an exact replica of what he'd been admitted with, except more severe...and far more advanced. It all nagged at the back of his mind.

_Weird..._

The shrill ringing of his cell phone interrupted his thoughts.

House paused, one hand about to push the answer button. He hadn't bothered to charge his cell for awhile, but…that didn't mean he had forgotten his ringtones. Snoop Dogg for Foreman. Kumbaya for Cameron. Britney Spears for Chase. Stacy's was an evil laugh, Cuddy's was an eviler cackle, and Wilson had ended up with The Song that Never Ends because he ran out of music to freeload. But no, this wasn't any of them. Neither annoying, nor catchy, nor gay. Which could only mean…

An unknown number?

Did that telemarketer clinic patient finally make good on her spam threats?

"Sir, I need you to place all your metallic possessions in the basket."

House glanced up at the security guard, then back down at his cell phone screen. Unknown number. Unknown, but not necessarily unheard of. The first few digits seemed vaguely familiar…perhaps something to do with a previous case? Fletcher had left _his_ cell phone number, but as far as he could recall, the journalist only knew House's work number at the hospital, not his private cell (which he rarely used anyway). Then again, these reporter types had a way of squirreling out unlisted information…

"_Sir_." The security guard glared at him, one hand held out expectantly for the electronic device. His partner roused from his position by the metal detector. "Your cell phone, please."

"Yeah, yeah. Just trying to save a dying baby here." House gave the number one last glance before canceling the call and tossing the phone into the basket along with his car keys. If Fletcher really needed another consult, he could leave a message on his voice mail. For now, the only thing House was willing to diagnose was a case of red eye – coupled with a good night's sleep.

--o--

The hospital doors were clear glass, so House saw the chaos before they even began to slide open, though that still didn't give him enough time to truly recover. His eyebrows arched upwards as he halted and regarded the scene before him.

It definitely had not been this bad when he'd left yesterday afternoon.

Old women, daughters, babies, obsessively worried parents, massive hypochondriacs. Families shuffling back and forth in the lobby, rubbing at runny noses and stopping every few minutes to ask a nurse, already overloaded with cases, when the next doctor could see them. Humanity crunched into a chaotic little box. All here, concentrated in one area, and all with the flu.

"Hey!"

House turned at the voice to see Wilson approaching from the clinic doors. "Where've you been?" 

"Consult," House replied, stepping inside the clinic and looking around distractedly. "The hooker I hired wanted a check-up along with her regular dues." He turned to Wilson, noting a slightly glassy look in the other's brown eyes. After a brief moment, he dismissed it in favor of more important things. Namely, his dead patient and the fact that the hospital had become the new community hangout. "What's going on here?"

Wilson shrugged. "It just...filled up. Flu, mostly. Cuddy'll be glad you're back, we're really short on hands." His gaze flicked to his watch. Only five minutes, but that was valuable time given the amount of patients waiting for him. "A good number of the staff got sick, too."

"That doesn't include my peons, I hope."

"Dr. Wilson!" a new, female voice called. One of the nurses stuck her head around the corner. "You're needed in Exam Room Two."

House was fairly certain there was some version of "See you later" from Wilson, but he didn't register the exact words. His eyes latched onto a familiar figure striding quickly through the waiting room, head down and folder open in his hands as he examined a file beneath a curtain of blond hair.

"Chase!"

Chase stopped in his tracks and glanced up in time to see House snapping his fingers and making a "come hither" motion with his hand. He sighed and made his way over.

"Can this wait? It's a bit busy in here." Nevertheless, he reluctantly followed when House began limping out of the clinic. "And where've you been?"

"No, yes, and...irrelevant," House said, neatly answering all three questions. "Where's Cameron and Foreman?"

Chase shrugged. "Probably with patients like everyone else is. What's with the sudden round up?"

"Need to re-diagnose the dead patient that all of you have apparently forgotten about." House jabbed at the elevator button.

"Well, excuse us for paying more attention to the living when the hospital's completely filled and nearly a quarter of the nurses and doctors have called in sick," Chase shot back, annoyed, as his boss entered the elevator.

House poked his head out, slamming his cane with a bang against the sliding doors to hold them open. Chase started slightly.

"But you haven't," he snapped, even more scathingly than usual. House's patience was running razor thin. "Sorry, unsolved diagnostics cases trump clinic duty. You'll need a better excuse than that." He hit the door close button just as his subordinate stepped inside, and reached immediately for his Vicodin. Two pills popped neatly into his mouth.

"Clinic duty comes with Cuddy," Chase replied, though substantially less snippy than before. "I think Cuddy is a very good excuse."

"Yeah, if you're still in first year of med school. Have you forgotten _everything_ I've taught you about avoiding the hospital administrator?"

Chase rolled his eyes. "Look, will you tell me already why you've dragged me here? Our patient dying is very tragic. It may even be a mystery, but it's not like you can save him anymore."

"And what about the rest of the hospital?" House retorted, barely allowing Chase to finish. "You're gonna condemn them to death too?" He paused as the elevator doors slid open on the fourth floor, realizing he'd let slip about what had gone down in Florida. And that particular slip, Chase _hadn't_ missed, judging by the bewildered look on the other's face.

He shoved the issue aside. "Get Cameron and Foreman, meet me back at the conference room," House said, already disappearing down the hallway.

"What?" Chase blinked, his mind still back at his boss's last comment. Condemning the hospital to death? He struggled briefly to understand what could possibly have been meant by that line, but could only come up with a strictly literal interpretation. One that didn't make much sense. "I—I'm fairly certain Michael was an isolated incident..." He trailed off as House didn't even cast a look back.

Wasn't it an isolated case? Of course. Of that there was no doubt, or else he would've heard about it...

Chase exhaled loudly. Obviously, this wasn't going to be clarified for him any time soon. He pulled out his pager and beeped his two colleagues.

--o--

The whiteboard had been wiped clean, but House was staring at the blank surface, black marker in hand, as though it surely held the meaning of life. "What were his symptoms upon admission?"

There was a moment of silence as his team exchanged quick glances, during which each concluded that none of the other two knew precisely what was going on. Chase's earlier comment seemed to sum it up pretty well – _House thinks we're all condemned to die. It's making him a bit pricklier than usual._

"First or second admission?" Foreman asked finally.

"Second," House replied.

Foreman shrugged one shoulder slightly. "Usual flu symptoms. Fatigue, cough, fever..."

"Hundred and three," Cameron said from where she was sitting closest to the cabinets. Her fingers were curled around the handle of her mug, but she had yet to take a drink. "It just spiked all of a sudden."

House's hand moved rapidly as he scribbled all that down. "Respiratory?"

"All the classic symptoms." Foreman shifted in his seat. "Why are we doing another differential on this patient? He's a little beyond medicine now."

House outright ignored him. "The respiratory symptoms did him in?"

There was hesitation from all three.

"Yeah," Chase said at last, choosing to take the least painful route. He'd been with House long enough to know that unless it affected your personal interests, it was far better not to ask any questions when his boss was in this kind of mood. In any case, he was either going to sit here and do the differential or go back to the clinic. The first option sounded far more appealing.

"Respiratory failure," Cameron said. "It was almost like pneumonia."

"But not," Chase added, squinting in thought. He chewed absently on the end of a wooden stirring stick.

House paused a moment before continuing writing. _Orlando guy mimicked pneumonia, as well._ By now, his hunch was obviously correct—whatever the guy in Florida had had, this kid had caught it, too. Maybe Mikey had wanted to see Mickey. _How_ wasn't so much the question here, though, but _what_.

_What is this?_

The flu, pneumonia, and plague. A three in one? Did God decide to hold a promotion because His diseases weren't selling so well?

House frowned at the whiteboard. Nothing. Even the most useful member of his team couldn't give him a diagnosis. Maybe the board needed more symptoms as sacrifice before it would be appeased.

"How much blood was there?" he asked.

Cameron blinked. "There...wasn't any."

House stopped abruptly in the middle of his writing, pen still poised at the tail end of 'hemorrha.' Obviously, one of his assumptions was incorrect. "No hemoptysis, even?" he asked, turning to face his team.

Foreman shook his head. "There was a lot of coughing. None of which produced blood."

House crossed out the unfinished word. Bleeding presented in only a portion of the cases? Possible...

"He might've just not had a chance to, though," said Chase. "The blastomycosis had severely compromised his lungs. They failed pretty fast."

The marker began flipping deftly through the fingers of House's hand, stopping when it hit his pinky and reversing back the other way.

Michael had died before the hemorrhaging could kick in. That was also entirely possible.

"What about the swelling around the neck?" House registered his team's unanimous surprise before he even turned again to face them.

"How did you know?" Cameron asked, breaking the short silence.

"Yeah, how _did_ you know?" Foreman's inquiry contained far less curiosity and more suspicion. "Since you were conveniently absent during the admission."

Chase only dipped the stirring stick into his coffee and then began to suck on the wood, briefly wondering if he'd get a splinter from this. Not that he wasn't curious as to how House knew, either, but he figured Foreman would put enough pressure for all three of them. Besides which, he wasn't in the mood for further argument.

House locked his sarcastic gaze onto Foreman. "I had my palm read in the morning, said my head line was out of sync. What about the swelling around the neck?" he asked again, louder.

"Yes, there was swelling," Foreman replied, irritation tinting his voice. "Now, how did you know? I know you didn't read the file."

"Ah, but someone left me an audio book version of it."

"Was it a patient you had before, presenting with the same signs?" Cameron asked. It wouldn't be the first time this had occurred.

House disregarded her comment entirely. "Any bruising?"

Chase had stopped nibbling on the stirring stick. "Not quite, but his swollen tissue turned black. Bit like the bubonic plague."

House scribbled the last bit down and stared at the board. Still no answer. _Not enough sacrifices, perhaps,_ he thought wryly, and then promptly realized that that was true.

"Something's missing here," he muttered to himself.

Respiratory failure. Swelling. Fever.

Dammit. What was he missing?

House set his cane aside and began slowly to connect the dots, circling first one symptom, then another, and joining them together in reverse order of appearance. Arrows pointed every which way. He hardly noticed his team watching him, with even Foreman ceasing to press for answers to his mysterious actions.

Cough...fever...dizziness...and what? What else had Michael come in with?

Or maybe that was the wrong question. What had _brought_ him in?

_Bingo._

He squeezed in the last symptom, barely fitting it into the upper left hand corner. The messy, tiny writing left the word looking like a mangled spider web.

House stepped back, eyes fixed on the final piece of the puzzle.

Blackout.

Blackout preceded the onset of every infection.

Michael had _caught_ this. He doubted any bodily fluids had been exchanged between the kid and the Russian, or even anyone the latter might've gotten intimate with. No environmental factors, no contaminants. Not to mention its strong resemblance to influenza and, to some extent, the plague. Which could only mean one thing –

Whatever this was, it was most likely contagious by air.

--o--

The slight creak of an opening door was all the warning Cuddy received before House made his dramatic announcement.

"We've got an epidemic."

Fortunately, she'd just finished with her patient, a mother and daughter pair who hurried out the exit before the strange, cane-wielding madman could make any more proclamations. Cuddy turned to face House, one hand pressed dramatically against her chest in faux surprise.

"What?" she gasped. "Oh my God, all those sick people exhibiting the same symptoms, I was wondering what it meant." She snapped off her gloves and dropped them in the metal garbage can.

"This isn't a regular flu epidemic," House said, walking closer to stop just a couple of feet before her. "It's national." His gaze looked deadly serious. "A lot of these people are going to die."

Cuddy lifted an eyebrow, not sure what to make of this. On the one hand, she couldn't dismiss House's medical instincts, having witnessed them personally during the maternity ward crisis, but on the other...national epidemic seemed to be a gross overstatement at the moment, crowded waiting room or not.

"House," she said finally, "I know a lot of these people are getting hit harder than expected, but I'm happy to report none of them have actually died, aside from your usual seniors and infants."

House waved his hand, dismissing her statement. "My patient had the flu when he was admitted. We fixed him up, gave him amphotericin, and sent him home with a mild cough. One day later, he was dead." He thrust a file into her hands, the corners of some of the papers sticking out of the manila folder as though he'd shoved them in there in a rush. "These were his test results."

After a moment's hesitation, Cuddy flipped through the tests. CBC and viral load. An unusually high white count for someone who was supposed to be recovering for the former, and a spike in the virus for the latter. Definitely strange, true. Nevertheless —

"It's still only one patient," she said, tucking the papers in neatly before handing the file back. "One who was already sick with another infection, at that. Furthermore," she went on, eyes narrowing a little, "you said national. This isn't national based on what you just told me, it's only in Princeton." She studied him intently. "Who's the other case study?"

House paused. There was no way out of it. He could lie, but even he knew he couldn't possibly withhold information for petty reasons when there was a crisis at this level. "The patient I had down in Florida. 45-yr-old military man, died of respiratory failure brought on by advanced infiltrates into the lungs. His charts showed the exact same symptoms upon admittance."

Cuddy, to his mild surprise, didn't immediately attack him. Instead, she only sighed. "I knew it wasn't just any consult," she muttered, folding her arms. "Well, reports are that Florida's been hit the hardest this flu season. They've got overcrowding in the hospitals and an unusually high mortality rate." She threw out a hand slowly. "House, if we don't even know what we're dealing with when the epidemic's already reached this level…" _If_ there was an epidemic, she reminded herself. She did trust House – on very few items, but she trusted him nonetheless – yet something of this magnitude required a few phone calls and meetings on her own to confirm.

"If it's spread this fast in just a matter of days, then we're all likely to catch it as well," House said, speaking what they both had on their minds. He stopped suddenly, recalling one of the first things he'd seen upon entering the hospital – Wilson, eyes red from strain, tucking away a pill bottle as he made his way toward the elevators. House had downed enough medication to know when someone else was overdosing on painkillers.

"Or maybe one of us already has..."

He spun on his heel, disappearing out of the room as abruptly as he'd come in.

--o--

The office door swung wide open without so much as a knock from House.

"You're not suffering from a hangover."

Wilson jolted slightly from the sudden intrusion, one hand still rubbing the bridge of his nose. "Wha – "

"When'd you first get that headache?" House asked, ignoring the other's protest. He walked behind the desk and laid his hand on Wilson's forehead. "A day ago, two days?"

Wilson leaned back from the touch, a little bewildered. His chair squeaked. "House, it's…just a headache. Happens when they send you too much paperwork in size eight font." Although that wasn't quite true, he thought privately, as he waved at the folders scattered across his desk.

House only shifted the cane in his grip, appearing less than convinced. "Right, and when said paperwork has been sitting on your desk untouched for the last 48 hours, that's when the migraine really kicks in." His hand dropped to cup the other's neck, feeling for swollen lymph nodes. After a moment, his eyes narrowed briefly.

"You're running a fever." House let his cane rest against the side of the desk, then reached for the stethoscope still hanging around Wilson's shoulders. "How long have you been working in the clinic?" He started unbuttoning his colleague's shirt, steel end pressed above the other's lungs as he listened for decreased breathing.

Seeing that his friend wasn't about to be brushed off, Wilson relented to the impromptu check-up. He pinched the bridge of his nose. House's sudden visit seemed to be causing his headache to flare up even more.

"I don't know, a lot, it was busy – House." He pushed the stethoscope away firmly. "I was vaccinated. If I've caught something, it's just the common cold." Wilson tugged at the flaps of his jacket, as he stood up to leave. There were still at least five patients waiting on him back at the clinic, and this wasn't even his official break yet. All he'd come for was some aspirin.

"Either way, I'm fine." He paused, frowning at the way the exit seemed to spin in his vision. "And thirsty."

His next step took him directly into House, who stumbled backward, arm thrown out to steady the other as he tried to ward off their imminent collapse upon the weight of his cane. The force of the fall was too much for his balance, however, and a sudden slip in grip caused him to nearly trip over himself when the added burden shifted abruptly onto his bad leg. Pain jolted upward, an agonizing electric shock. He cursed as he lurched further back, a complete crash only stemmed by the presence of the bookcase against his back. Several picture frames fell over as House grasped it for support.

…So much for the definitive diagnosis, then.

He eased Wilson to the floor and himself into a chair, his hand absently massaging his thigh to ease the dulling pain, as he contemplated the gravity of the situation. His eyes flicked to the prone form before him.

Breathing, but clearly out of it. No head trauma. Just a sudden loss of consciousness.

Two patients, miles apart. Significant age gap. Vastly different histories. One died within days; the other took several weeks. But two things had been exactly the same – both had gone by means of respiratory failure.

And both had suffered a blackout before entering a phase of rapid deterioration.


	9. Chapter 8

**Title:** Pathology  
**Rating:** PG  
**Pairing:** None  
**Description:** House wrestles with the diagnosis further, but comes up with little of worth except one ominous fact. Meanwhile, the hospital is put under quarantine and Wilson begins to grow sicker…  
**Author's Note:** Long time, no update ; so sorry about that. I've got everything outlined in detail up to Chapter 12 (which marks the end of the first part), but have been writing the scenes out of order. Hopefully, the patchwork doesn't come through in the final story.

It was odd that a place like the hospital could seem even colder and more depressing, but apparently, it wasn't impossible. Nothing like a rampaging virus to put a damper on things.

"They've quarantined the hospital." Cameron's voice was already floating into House's office before she entered there herself. She tossed a stack of files on the already cluttered desk. The corner of it knocked over a half-empty box of Tic-Tacs that was no doubt left there by Chase. "State department is restricting all travel in and out of Princeton-Plainsboro until they can pinpoint the source of the infection." She leaned down and snatched up the fallen Tic-Tac box irritably.

"Not surprised." The words were spoken neutrally. Foreman appeared to be the least dejected out of all of them. "Would hate to be just a visitor."

"I'm hoping it won't last too long," said Chase. He had one leg drawn up on the seat of his chair and was bouncing the eraser end of a pencil against his knee.

Cameron found an empty chair in the cramped office and sat down. "They say it usually takes a day or two, but it may extend up to a week depending on the type of disease."

"Which means they don't know." A new voice. House immediately made for his seat behind the desk, twirling the cane thoughtfully in his hand as he walked. "The government boys are as clueless about this as we are." He plunked down in his chair.

Chase stopped bouncing his pencil. "Or more."

Foreman glanced up without lifting his head. "You really can't get much more clueless than we are right now." At least, he hoped you couldn't. If you were at rock bottom, then you could only go up, right?

Right.

Or you could merely stay where you were for good.

"What've they been saying about the symptoms?" Cameron didn't specify who she meant by "they." It didn't matter. "They" referred to anybody who, when they said something, it was deemed as "official."

"Not much," Foreman said. "They're saying it's like the flu, but more dangerous. Which is the same conclusion everyone else has essentially come up with by now."

"And not much else," Chase added, not quite so helpfully.

"Which is the same conclusion everyone else has _also_ essentially come up with by now." For the first time, Foreman sounded less dispassionate and more snappish.

"Trust the CDC to feed us the obvious." There was a brief pause before House stood abruptly as something suddenly occurred to him. "Which room in the morgue did they move his body to?"

Foreman was already shaking his head. "Not a good idea, I'd say, considering how contagious this thing seems to be."

House didn't physically wave off the warning, but one could almost see him doing so. "If it's as contagious as the flu, then we're all exposed now. Doesn't matter if I touch the guy or cut him up like a watermelon, once the virus is in the air, the infection's going to spread all the same."

Chase frowned. That was a pleasant thought. "Not everyone's going to see it that way," he said. "I'm betting people are already starting to point fingers at our hospital and saying it's all our fault."

"We can't do it anyway," Cameron broke in. Heads swiveled in her direction.

"CDC took Michael's body an hour ago," she said. "It's under containment until they can transport it down to Atlanta."

_Wait a minute._ House rounded on her. "Why didn't you tell me this earlier?"

"Because Cuddy told us not to mention it earlier." She stepped forward defiantly. "You can't autopsy him, House. It would...endanger the whole hospital, risk exposing everyone to an even more virulent strain of the virus, or body fluids that might—"

House matched her step, his cane slamming hard against the tiled floor. "We're _already_ exposed!" He threw his hands towards the door. "Anyone who's worked here, treated here, walked inside these doors—they're all going to die because you chose protocol over actually diagnosing this disease." The word _protocol_ was nearly spat out.

Foreman was the first to break the long silence that followed. "Why am I getting a sense of deja vu here?"

"Well..." Chase hesitated. "At least one of us isn't sick this time." There was a thoughtful pause. "Why is that? Shouldn't we have been the first ones to come down with this?"

"Don't jinx it," Foreman said. "The isolation room really isn't that fun."

"And the hospital food downright sucks." House paced to his desk, then back again, restless. "This disease moves fast, but only after actual onset occurs. Before the triggering blackout, regular flu symptoms can linger for days, weeks, possibly months without progressing into full blown respiratory form." By now, he was at the window. The grey, drizzly weather outside was fitting for the mood he was in. When he spoke next, it was almost as a thought to himself.

"Which means a lot of people out there who are sick probably don't have a clue they're carrying the disease."

_Damn it._

House spun on his heel and was out the door before anyone could interject another word.

"Wait!" Foreman had to break into a jog to catch up with the other doctor. For someone with a lame leg, House moved surprisingly fast. "Where're you getting all this information from? This has to have something to do with your twenty-four hour disappearance." He stopped following as it became clear House wasn't going to give him a direct answer.

He did, however, give a sarcastic wink. "Make it twenty-three, and then you can call CTU."

--o--

"Great view you've got here."

House leaned back against the quarantine room wall, cane gripped loosely in one hand, as he tapped a sporadic rhythm against the thick glass. He caught Wilson's glance from the corner of his eye. The other man had been sitting, one leg crossed, upon the hospital bed, gaze roving blankly over the several patients who had also been confined here with the same, flu-like symptoms. None of them looked particularly happy.

"Glass walls, picture windows, TV monitor up in the top right-hand corner," House continued on, "Cuddy could make a fortune renting this place out to hospital donors." He gestured at the room for emphasis.

Wilson rolled his eyes slightly and got up off the bed. "It is a rather gorgeous view. You don't get fluorescent lights like that anywhere. They really just illuminate the tiles brilliantly," he remarked, stopping in front of the speaker panel where House was situated calmly. "Of course, all of that is overridden by the fact that I am in a quarantine room, confined to a bed, without the faintest clue why there is a biosafety sign hanging right outside my window."

"Hey, the landscape can only get better with me here, right?"

"With you, there is no more landscape. Your ego consumes it all." He gave House a meaningful look as he got down to the point. "You know, I'm fine. The only reason I'm still running a fever is because you stuffed me with Interferon."

"Which, coincidentally, also explains your sudden collapse right before they brought you here." House gasped, pretending to come about a revelation. "Oh wait, in this universe, effect actually _follows_ cause."

His friend only sighed and shook his head. "You realize that if I'm not really sick, putting me in a room with people who _are_ may not be the best of ideas?"

"Or – just thinking outside the box here – you could really be sick, and putting you in a hospital room would let us treat the illness properly without resorting to you popping aspirin all day," the other man replied, completely ignoring the irony laden in his ending statement. As if for added emphasis, he dug out the Vicodin bottle from his suit pocket and swallowed a pill.

"House, I have never seen you take an interest in a case of the sniffles."

House cocked his head. "Really? Then what was that blackout thirty minutes ago?"

"It was..." Wilson faltered, hand waving to one side as he searched for an answer. "A very long lasting hangover." Or something vaguely of the sort. The excuse sounded even more pathetic with the look House was giving him.

"Yeah...uh...if the bartender drugged you with GHB," his friend quipped, eyes squinting sarcastically.

Wilson looked mildly disturbed at the thought. "Somehow, that seems more like something you would do," he replied.

House snapped his fingers. "Damn. Should've switched the glasses," he cursed in mock disappointment, lips pursing together into a U. "Don't worry though, I've still got plenty of pictures." Smirking, he gestured with his cane.

"As long as they're not accessible through Google," Wilson muttered dryly.

The other man's smirk grew wider. "Why put them up for free if I can make a profit on eBay?" He squinted into the air, head poised as if reading off some invisible business proposal. "Gay...men's...entertainment. I sense a check in the upcoming weeks."

Wilson raised a none-too-curious eyebrow. "I'd ask if I'll be getting any money from this, but I think I'd best not even touch that."

House paused, eyes narrowing suggestively.

"...I'll touch it for you."

There was a long silence as Wilson struggled not to read into that.

"I'm…almost positive you came here for a medical reason," he remarked, if only to steer the conversation away from dangerous waters. Or rather, towards them, seeing as how he still didn't know why he had been brought here, or who the other patients in the room were, or what exactly they thought he might have that could warrant a biosafety threat. The last one was perhaps the most worrying. Wilson rubbed uneasily at the back of his neck, fingers tugging at the hospital gown's flimsy material as he gazed levelly his friend.

House seemed to acknowledge the seriousness in his tone. "I've ordered a CBC and a viral load check, as well as an ELISA for your antigen levels." He paused a fraction of a second before adding, "Cuddy put me as your presiding."

Wilson stopped at his boss's name. Cuddy. Cuddy had authorized this. Which meant she had contacted the CDC as well. Locked a group of unrelated people in a quarantine room without a word of notice and assigned House as his presiding doctor – a diagnostician, not an immunologist, not a neurologist, not a government specialist – a _friend_ of his. Theirs. A veritable taboo.

His eyes drifted up slowly to lock with House's.

"She knew I'd steal any other doctor's notes otherwise."

Wilson studied his friend hard, as if considering the weight of that remark. His response was simple and curt. "Let me know when the results come back." Turning, he made as though to return to his place at his bed, beside the metal hospital cart, before pausing abruptly and asking, "Speaking of Cuddy, has she just lost another twenty million in addition to the hundred from last time?"

"Nope," House answered glibly, getting up from his position by the wall. "Cuddy owes _me_ twenty million and a lifetime of free clinic hours."

"She does." Wilson looked skeptical. "Well, I suppose that makes sense. You did return extremely fast, so either you made a huge impression within just a couple of hours, or you blew it within seconds."

His friend cracked out the old, sardonic smile. "Hey, what's not to impress? I've got the cane, the charm, the fuzzy teddy bear smile…" That last one no doubt referring to his whiskered face. "Mr. Raymond was lost before I even got there." Smirking, House turned the conversation deftly around to focus on Wilson's competitive edge. "At this rate, you're gonna have a challenger for donations next year."

Wilson, however, did not look particularly impressed. "Right. Did you try and slip GHB in his drink, too? Or maybe you've changed." His eyes narrowed, suspicion coloring their depths in shrewd appraisal. There was something far too deceitful about House's offhandedness. "It seems you have, because the other you would've been gloating about securing the hospital a hefty check to anyone and everyone all day yesterday, epidemic or no."

House shrugged. "Who says I haven't?"

Wilson poked a finger accusingly in the other's direction. "See? That's you being evasive by pretending to act casual." He stopped in front of the panel, one hand pressed to the glass, and fixed his friend with a long, hard gaze. Simplicity was the reason House always gave for keeping things from his patients. Simplicity and distrust. His own cynicism for anything that came out of a person's mouth, which wasn't backed by solid facts a computer or test might verify. And yet…

Wilson could see neither in his friend's eyes at the moment. Instead, a flicker – of anger? doubt? – crossed their shadows, and nothing more.

"What were you doing in Florida?" he asked quietly.

House faked a page.

"Oops, looks like those tests are back. Gotta run," he said, sounding falsely bright. His cane clicking against the floor tiles as he exited rapidly toward the hallway.

"Hey – Okay, that's definitely a lie, it's been five minutes." Wilson threw up his hands in exasperation. It was like prying a bone from a bulldog, trying to get information from House. "Tell me what happened!" he called after the other's retreating form.

The response came echoing back faintly from down the corridor.

"Sweden says they're awarding me the Nobel Prize."

--o--

A rap of the cane was the only warning that the fellows got before House swept into the conference room, jacket slightly askew, and proceeded to attack the whiteboard with a vengeance.

"We have three patient case studies." He divided the surface into several columns, scrawling a capital _M_ above the first. "Patient M presented with blackout and fever, persistent cough, progressed quickly to respiratory arrest from what we believe to be blastomycocal involvement." Symptoms appeared on the chart almost as fast as he ticked them off aloud. "The fungus was treated, the patient discharged, then twenty-four hours later re-admitted with severe lung infiltrates, facial swelling, spike in temperature, which ultimately led to a second respiratory arrest and death."

House barely stopped for a moment before moving on to the second column of the differential chart. "Patient N began with late stage respiratory distress, delirium, swelling, rapidly deteriorating into hemoptysis and multiple organ failure. He died of cardiac arrest fourteen hours ago. Patient – " There was a split second's pause, followed by a subtle shift in the direction the marker was moving, the beginning stroke of a _W_ changed to that of another letter. Only Foreman noticed. " – J presented with mild fever, dizziness, and sudden onset blackout identical to that of patient M. Currently holding stable at 99.4 oC on six MIU of Interferon." He turned to face his staffers.

"All three of these cases originated from the same viral strain." House capped the end of the pen and tapped it restlessly against the palm of his hand. "How do we treat it?"

"Wait a minute, where did Patient J come from?" Chase blinked at the last column of the chart. He was pretty sure none of the case files they'd been poring through had a _J_ in their first name.

House shrugged it off dismissively. "Guy from the clinic. Cuddy sent him to the quarantine room a few hours ago."

Realization slowly dawned on Foreman as to the patient's true identity. He shot a quick glance at his colleagues, but got no confirmation. "If it's viral, we can use Interferon – though so far, it doesn't seem to be working all that well in the patients we're treating."

"Then we need another treatment. Something that's specific to this strain of influenza A."

"Oseltamivir," Cameron suggested tentatively. "It's...shown a lot of promise in fighting influenza."

"Something this strong, it's got to be more than just simple influenza, or even a resistant strain of influenza," Foreman said.

Chase frowned to himself. "You mean like a mutation?"

"It's certainly happened before."

"But if it's based on influenza A, oseltamivir might still be effective," Cameron argued.

House scribbled the treatment down on the whiteboard. "Administer seventy milligrams of oseltamivir with five hundred milligrams of probenecid, and see where that takes us. More options, people."

"Ribavirin, to go more broad-spectrum."

"What about preventative?" Chase asked, eyebrows knitting together. "We're losing staff quickly, if we use mantadine or rimantadine – "

"Measured resistance is over ninety percent for the H3N2 strain," Cameron cut him off.

"But we don't know if this is H3N2," House pointed out. "And until the CDC boys decide to share their lab results with us, we're in the dark for exact H-N targets. However..." His eyes narrowed thoughtfully as he stared at the symptoms on the whiteboard, one hand slowly unhooking his cane. "...we _can_ approximate the viral epidemiology using known strains that have caused pandemics in the past."

"Well, all influenza A strains tend to cause pandemics."

"Spanish flu came from the H1N1 strain." Cameron recalled all the medical history she'd spent weeks studying as part of her thesis. "This might be similar, cause of death primarily due to a cytokine storm. Too many immune cells activated."

House nodded at the suggestion. "Give ACE inhibitors to patients suffering from third stage ARDS, and tell Cuddy to make some calls for the OX40-IG experimental treatment. If it's a cytokine reaction, then the immunoglobin should reduce T-cell response."

"Antisense is known to be effective in preventing the hemorrhaging of Ebola…at least in monkeys. It's still in test phases, but we might be able to stop internal bleeding that way." Crossing his arms, Foreman split his attention between the whiteboard and his boss's strained expression. If this had extended to the clinic, and the clinic had started infecting the doctors in so short a time…then the virus was even more malignant than they'd originally thought it to be. No wonder the health department was keeping such a tight lid on things. Of course, this brought up the question of exactly how _House_ knew all these little details without having been in the same state for the last two days.

Chase pointed out their main dilemma. "We also have a bit of a problem telling who has this, and who just has the regular flu during the initial stages. There isn't enough room to put everyone on a bed, and we don't have enough nurses to attend to them either."

"The difference," House began, voice falling into lecturer mode, "between a coral snake and a milk snake is that the coral will bite when cornered." Pausing, he waited for one of his subordinates to recognize the metaphor in their current situation. He waited for several long moments. "The milk snake, on the other hand, only has its bluff to protect it from those big, frightening predators trampling all over its territory. Once that bluff is called," he continued, "it's got to turn tail and run before all the other predators realize that its bite isn't quite as poisonous as its red-white-and-yellow striped bark makes it out to be." House wound up triumphantly to deliver the key link in his comparison. "Give the ambiguous cases a hard dose of general flu medicine, and see what the response is. If it folds, we'll know it's just the regular stuff. If it bites…" He trailed off, cane twirling in one hand. "Well then, we'll see just how far this superflu reaction will go."

"That's far too subjective." Cameron was the first to protest. "Our resources are already stretched thin as it is, we can't waste them to determine who's really sick and who's not."

"Well, the only other option we have is to throw _all_ of them into treatment, which essentially uses up our resources the same way, only it takes longer," her blond-haired colleague rationalized in response. For once, Foreman was uncharacteristically quiet.

They all looked in silence at their boss.

"Zanamivir, M2 inhibitors, antivirals." The words echoed hollowly without his usual conviction. "Whatever's worked against influenza in the past, give it to the patients."

"So we're just going to stuff them full of medicine and cross our fingers?" Foreman raised a skeptical eyebrow.

"You've got a better idea?" House snapped, more than simply his usual irritation showing through. "Because I'm just dying to hear your cure." He stopped, hearing the tension crackle in his own voice, and realized that he was yelling. Quite loudly, in fact, given the look of the people out in the hallway. One hand went up to rub at the bristles on the side of his face. "Anyone who's not immune has contracted this, and anyone who's contracted this has progressed through every one of these symptoms until death." Turning slowly, his gaze swept once more over the columns of the whiteboard chart, settling inevitably on its last line.

"The mortality rate is a hundred percent." House's eyes belied a tremor. "No one's recovered."

--o--

The knocking of a cane on glass drew Wilson out of his musings by the hospital monitor, where he had been observing the tiled pattern of the floor from his vantage point on top of his bed. They'd brought two more patients in since this morning, an elderly man with a severe cough and a young woman with breast cancer, who had collapsed shortly before her chemo session. She'd woken up here, alone, confused, grasping for answers from the various other people in the quarantine. Wilson had none to give her. He had none to give anyone, whatever the worth of his position at the hospital was.

Occasionally, a nurse would come by to check (from outside the window) on their comfort – as if the size of the pillows was the least of their worries – but aside from the initial visit by the state health officials who brought House's patient family and friends in, all still in shock at Michael's death, there had been no word from the outside world. An ominous sense of detachment surrounded them, much as the quarantine room cut them off from the muted chaos above.

Wilson looked up at another rap of the cane, and made his way reluctantly over to the far window. Something was stuck on the glass right beneath his nose. A sticky note. His sticky note. On the back of which was scrawled a brief, barely legible message in the all-too-familiar handwriting of his lunch thief colleague.

_Commandeered by Gregory House_

Wilson glanced up, annoyed. "I wasn't informed that my lunch had become a British warship."

"Actually..." Peeling back the container's plastic top, House gestured at himself with his fork. "...I'm the British warship. You're the unfortunate merchant vessel that got caught up in a conflict with France."

"I see." Wilson looked anything but impressed by the abrupt history lesson. "And this makes taking advantage of the ill better?"

House shrugged and began digging into the food. "Only if Napoleon could cook." He took a large bite, eyes turning upward to the ceiling. "Chicken, rice, and...peppers, am I right? Thursday is for Southern cuisine." Swallowing, he let his eyelids flutter for a moment, deliberately savoring the meal's taste in front of his companion. A sideways glance confirmed his intended effect on the other man.

Wilson sighed and gazed forlornly at the food – his food – being devoured quite rapidly in front of him. He had made that just this morning, in House's dusty little kitchen, wondering where his friend might have gone off to so abruptly without leaving so much as a word. Not that House was particularly prone to allaying fears with a well-placed note or message, but usually, Wilson could tell when his eccentric companion had come up with some crazy idea that required mysterious disappearances in the middle of the night. Instead, this time, he was left pondering the whereabouts of his pasta strainer at 2 AM on the living room couch, while the clock ticked off the seconds until his partner's return. His home life hadn't changed, merely reversed.

"If you ever end up in the hospital again, I'm getting dishes specially made for you."

"Oh, but that would take away the joy of swiping them from the oncology lounge, right under your nose," House responded cheerfully.

Wilson just shook his head. "Is there _nothing_ that will prevent you from satisfying your wants first?"

House licked his fork thoughtfully as he gave this question some serious consideration. "Well, I'd be willing to trade food for some porn," he began slowly, weighing his bargaining chips. "The good stuff, not _L Word_ re-runs."

"Trading one appetite for another," Wilson remarked dryly.

House crooked his lips in a smirk. "That's how man progressed."

"It's also how both my lunches and my DVD collection progressed from numerous to very few." Taking a step forward, Wilson gave the other man a sharp, pointed look. "If I pretend to be a dying man, would you grant me my one wish of getting something other than hospital food?"

House slowed his chewing at those words, a flicker of disquiet coloring his eyes before he abruptly shoved the fork into the food and slid it through the glass panel between them. He cast a sideways glance to ensure the nurse by the station wasn't looking.

"Your generosity truly astounds me." Wilson took his lunch from the panel and started munching on his food, studying his colleague from beneath narrowed eyes. House had something else on his mind other than the usual thieving torment. Sickbed visits were almost always an excuse to mask some larger purpose, one he rarely ever informed his patients of, and which only revealed themselves in the midst of a dire confrontation. Besides which, House gave in far too easily to the lunch request – any other time, he would've actually made Wilson feign the pleading dying man (a free show) before agreeing to some sort of semi-trade-off. Then again, this wasn't exactly "any other time."

Waving his fork in front of him, Wilson asked after swallowing a bite, "What's the status out there?"

"Busy, as always. Cuddy's taking full advantage of your incarceration to make the rest of us cover extra clinic hours."

"That's one upside." Wilson chewed thoughtfully. "Clinic hours increasing or steady?"

House twisted his face into one of mock concentration. "Based on the number of times floppy hair has been in to touch up his shine, I'd have to say about the same as always when she's on PMS. You really should've swiped her Red Clover when you had the chance," he added.

The image of House's Australian fellow carefully combing back his locks in the middle of the clinic (especially with nurse Brenda around) drew a smile from Wilson, who took another bite of chicken and asked, half-jokingly, "So nobody died yet, huh?"

He didn't expect a straight answer, and got none.

"Died? No. Wished someone would put them out of their misery? Probably." House tilted his head in sarcastic candor. "If your teary-eyed nurse crew doesn't stop sobbing for Dr. Wilson within the next hour, I think I'll be joining you in there."

His friend chuckled wryly. "Now _that_ will definitely kill a few people." Wilson's eyes flicked over the quarantine room, counting off patients in his head. A few had been added since House's last visit. "Six to be exact." Pausing, he reconsidered. "Maybe just five."

House raised an eyebrow in question. "What, Jimmy doesn't count?"

"Being your roommate for a good amount of time, I'd say my tolerance of you is significantly higher." Wilson shoved his fork in the other's direction. "I'll _definitely_ outlive them all."

His words were followed by a sharp cough, several coughs, deep, wet heaves that convulsed painfully through the center of his chest and up his throat. The plastic lunch container clattered to the floor as he doubled over, hand fumbling for the IV stand to steady his balance.

_Productive cough...sudden onset?_ House wondered, unable to switch off his mental diagnostic process even now.

Several moments passed before the spasms subsided and Wilson was able to pull himself upright once more against the wall, breath slowly increasing from short gulps. Wetness flecked the edge of his lips. Copper filled his mouth. He knew what he would see even before his fingers came back, red with blood.

The window reflected back the visage of foreboding as Wilson's eyes met House's through the glass.

--o--

Tests. A battery of diagnostic tests. House was fairly certain tests were supposed to give the tester some useful answers, but the lab boys were determined to prove him wrong.

He had nothing. Nothing useful, anyway. Nothing that could _do_ anything. Wilson's serology report revealed little of note this far into the infection, and even taken in conjunction with Michael's blood work (he regretted not swiping Nikolai's when he had the chance), provided few definitive diagnostic avenues. True, there was an antibody that was starting to surface, a new one, but its implications were still murky to say the least…not a good prospect, given how swiftly this thing progressed.

The ringing of the phone made him jump. House hesitated. Who would be calling him on his office phone at this hour? He was usually reached by his cell phone or pager. Or someone bursting into his office, waving some sort of nonexistent emergency in his face.

Dropping the files onto his desk, he reached over far enough to hit the speakerphone button, too lazy to bother having to hold the actual phone. His docked iPod was nearly knocked over in the process.

"Hello?"

"House. It's Fletcher Stone. Get us off speaker."

_Fletcher._ House immediately sat up in his seat, interested already. If Fletcher was calling, he had to have something new on the superflu. The military base they pinpointed – a lead on the infection statistics, perhaps? Prior outbreaks they could glean some treatments from? At this point, House was willing to take almost any information he could get his hands on.

He did as Fletcher asked, picking up the receiver. "Go on."

"I don't have a lot of time, so don't interrupt." House could almost hear Fletcher shift the phone to his other hand. "Everyone's comparing this to the Spanish flu of 1918, spontaneous epidemic out of nowhere. Deadly, but born of a natural mutation. It's not."

"Wait, what're you saying?" House asked, completely forgetting Fletcher's warning about not interrupting. "This virus is manmade?"

"_Listen._ Yes. Yes, it's — " Fletcher broke off suddenly. The mouthpiece was muffled, but House could still hear the words on the other end, and some loud thumping. "Ma'am, could you please...ma'am, could you not — Lady! Get your own damned payphone!"

House lifted an eyebrow at nobody. Just how bad was it down in Florida? He started listening again as Fletcher continued on, almost as though he had never been interrupted.

"I don't know who released it, but this thing is _not_ a natural mutation."

"Where did you find all this?"

"It doesn't matter. The point is that I can prove it. The CDC — "

"The CDC is involved?" House wasn't sure why he was surprised, given the amount of times he'd remarked (sarcastically though it was) that the CDC had to have their hands in a conspiracy like this, but now that it was actually the truth...the prospect was a little hard to believe.

"I don't know. Probably. Maybe not all of them, but some of them." Fletcher was speaking fast, but not so fast that it was difficult to distinguish his words. He'd evidently had practice before. "They have something, there, documents. I haven't seen them for myself but my source says they're there. Only problem is — "

The connection cut off abruptly.

"Fletcher? Hello?" House pulled the phone away from his ear and blinked at it. Damn.

He hung up. What had that been about? Was what Fletcher said really the truth? House rarely took other people's statements – especially outlandish ones like this – at face value, preferring to figure things out for himself, but…given the current circumstances...that didn't seem quite feasible.

_Documents. What documents?_

He reached for the large ball on his desk and started tossing it from one hand to the other. The antibody test results from Wilson drifted to the back of his mind, as he pondered this new onslaught of information. Information that he had no idea what to do with. It couldn't help him find a treatment. It couldn't help him find a way to slow the virus down even a little bit.

But then. Neither had anything else.


	10. Chapter 9

**Title:** Pathology  
**Rating:** PG  
**Word Count:** 13,996  
**Description:** The CDC contemplates serious action, and the President makes a critical decision. Princeton-Plainsboro finds itself battling for resources to stay afloat.  
**Author's Note:** Why was this chapter so long to write TT. Mostly setting up the grand stage for future maneuverings, so unfortunately, you won't see as much of PPTH here except some token scenes with House, Wilson, and the ducklings. Not to worry, H/W shippers will find much more to chew on in the next chapter (which is again, extremely freaking long O as I attempt to bring in more _24_ people).

"We have an epidemic."

The words resounded somberly in the large meeting room.

"Orlando's already crippled, Princeton's well on its way to a city-wide quarantine. Preliminary estimates put it at about two hundred people affected, with another thirty within the initial contagion zone. NIH, USAMRIID, Health and Human Services are all working to pinpoint the source of the infection. We've got an influenza expert cross-matching strains from our database."

Ellsworth looked around at the team of scientists gathered hastily in the CDC command center at Atlanta. Specialists, all of them. Maria Schlessinger from quarantine logistics and control, an accomplished statistician with five years experience handling tough cases just like these in the national arena. Gerald Watson, their public relations officer, who did so much more with his political and journalistic contacts than any PR agency out there. Elizabeth Lansing, current EIS field coordinator, monitoring the situation in their two hot zones along with behaviorist, Ron Marshall. And, of course, Tom Roskin, who had an uncharacteristically vindicated look on his face, because for once, the wolf did appear after all.

The only person missing then was…

"Where's Wu in all of this?" Maria asked with a frown.

"Dr. Wu is currently en route from Nigeria with several epidemiologists to survey the situation. Should be arriving in about 0600 hours." John Wu was the CDC's head epidemiologist, and one of their best men in the field. He'd recently gone to Africa to track down an outbreak of Marburg virus somewhere near the south. Sam flipped open the folder of transmission statistics, skimming it for results. "Right now, we've got four fully trained EIS ground teams at each major location, headed by Dr. Lansing here and our state department liaison." Who had, up till now, done little more than throw up bureaucratic roadblocks in their way, Ellsworth added silently. "They have updates on the index case situation."

He nodded at them to report.

"We're pretty much positive by now that the initial spread began with a boy named Michael Falburg, aged sixteen, Caucasian, middle class." With a precise voice, Lansing read off the patient description as the projector threw a photograph up on the screen. "Fell ill on October 27th, was admitted to Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital, treated for blastomycosis and minor lung infection, then released. Two days later, re-admitted with severe ARDS, dying shortly in the ER." Another picture flipped up, this time a flow chart of the event proceedings with arrows indicating where each led from cause to effect. Her colleague from the state department pulled out a number of color-coded documents.

"Form 2210B here details some of the procedures performed by the medical team," he said with typical bureaucratic fervor – which was to say, a voice capable of putting a Chihuahua to sleep, "although it doesn't account for later state health measures in accordance with policy 37C of the…"

"How many people did the patient come into contact with?" Ellsworth broke in, before they all fell into a permanent coma.

"Well, we can't be sure at this point – the transmission scope is highly variable, and there's over twenty hospital members alone who could have passed within range after the initial onset," Lansing replied.

"Give me an estimate."

"That…" Her eyebrows drew together thinly above her smartly perched glasses. "Approximately seven percent of the current staff. Since his case was difficult to diagnose, Princeton-Plainsboro assigned him to a specialized department for treatment, but his re-admittance saw him brought to the general emergency room as well." She turned over the latest status report in the manila folder before her, seemingly troubled by a particular notation at the bottom of the paragraph. "We're fairly sure there's no further outside connection. However, it may be possible that one of the staff members who treated him crossed state borders after contact was made…"

Papers rustled around the room amid worried murmuring. Interstate affairs. A bad omen for any containment strategy. They couldn't be sure if this person was a carrier, was even infected in fact, but the stakes were too high to gamble any other way. Ellsworth peered closer at the name penciled in beneath the report's dense text.

_…Department of Diagnostics head, Dr. Gregory House, requested leave of absence three days following patient admission for an interstate consult…_

He blinked, then read the name again.

_Dr. Gregory House._

_Dr. House._

_House._

"Sam, are you all right?" Maria gave her colleague a look of concern. Ellsworth had been staring at the status report for a good ten minutes after the EIS head had moved on to patient outliers.

"Yes. Perfectly." Sam glanced up with an unusually tight, yet exuberant, expression on his face. "This might be the single solitary time when Dr. House's penchant for avoiding work will actually turn to our advantage." He smiled at her bemused look and turned back to the conversation once more.

"And his family? Friends?"

"They've all been quarantined as quickly as possible," Lansing continued. "We're still looking into secondary tier contact beyond the immediate vicinity."

"What about the Orlando case?" Ellsworth asked, satisfied for now with the progress in Princeton.

"That one…has been giving us difficulty in identifying." Ron Marshall stepped up to the projector this time, and switched the slide to a close-up of a pale, dark-spotted face against sterile white tiles. A photograph of the deceased. "Forty-four year old Russian male, military build, recent immigrant. No name or ID to speak of. Admitted 8:32 p.m., October 20th after being brought in by a Daniel Stroon – no relation to the subject – who found him collapsed about a block away from Orlando Medical Center. Presented with high fever and respiratory distress, apparently unconscious for the majority of the stay. Doctors diagnosed him with late stage antibiotic-resistant pneumonia and sent him to the ICU, but he remained unresponsive to treatment, deteriorating rapidly until multi-organ collapse. Although…" He frowned, eyes narrowing at the starred sentence in his notes. "It seems his vitals _did_ improve for a time, enough to briefly regain consciousness." Strange, how this didn't garner any attention earlier, especially with the nurses on duty in intensive care. "But so far, no one's come forward with any details."

They all mulled that over in silence.

"Infection Control should've reported this," Gerald spoke up. "What did the coroner's case find?"

"The coroner concluded what the attending already diagnosed – respiratory arrest due to excessive swelling and fluid in the lungs, consistent with high-grade pneumonia. Some anomalies in the upper esophageal region…but they weren't pursued at the time. MMWR has the full run-down, if you'll look in your briefing folders." Ron gestured at the thick manila files stacked before each of them on the tabletop. All but Tom deigned to accept the invitation.

Flipping through his documents intently, he focused on scanning the details of the _Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report_ in an attempt to squirrel out further pathological data that might aid his research into the virus. So far, progress was slow given how little they had to work with; samples had been difficult to obtain, cultures still delicate and few. Generally, odd cases like these would've gotten at least a passing glance from the CDC, but with Sam so overwhelmed and John out in Africa all this time, no one had paid much attention to a single isolated pneumonia case among a sea of much more colorful, and dangerous, pathogens.

Including Tom himself.

"And the autopsy? Was it similar to Princeton's index case?" Sam pressed.

"We're currently...in the process of assembling that information. Orange County usually buries several John Does in a single pauper's grave, so it took some time to disinter the body."

Ellsworth looked annoyed. "Well, make sure you tell the lab boys to get that thing to me ASAP. What's nex – "

"How can you be certain that either of these patients were isolated before?" Maria interrupted, a concerned expression on her face. "By your description, both cases had ample opportunity to travel prior to symptom onset, and even afterward, remained active in the general community before the severity of the illness brought them to a hospital. What's to say that they weren't infected by somebody else, who just flew under our radar?"

"Nothing."

They all turned to look at Tom Roskin.

"There's no absolute diagnostic criterion before the catalytic blackout."

A moment of silence followed as everyone attempted to decipher this piece of information.

"Could you…possibly elaborate on – "

"When we look within the icosahedral shell, what we are seeing is a distinct helical structure co-incorporating the negative-stranded RNA nucleocapsids, standard within any isometric virion such as influenza." Now that he'd gotten started on his academic tirade, Tom was a sight to behold, setting up slides, charts, diagrams at the front of the room in a blur of motion as he gestured animatedly along with his presentation. "The surface lattice can be roughly described via electron microscopy, or modeled here – " He pointed an old-fashioned meter stick (having never taken kindly to laser pointers, claiming they represented a potential work hazard) at a high contrast 3D scan on a stand. " – using the latest BIOQUANT P13.2 simulation software. Notice the subunit packaging of roughly 155/3 per turn and a pitch of 22 Ǻ. Clearly, this illustrates – "

"Dr. Roskin." Maria smiled stiffly. "I'm sure this is all very fascinating to a microbiologist, but could you possibly get to the point of your lecture?"

"Right, right. Hold your donkeys," Tom muttered to himself. He flipped through a series of increasingly complex and esoteric slides, most of which looked like they were more fit for a virology conference than an emergency CDC briefing (was that a Markov chain he had there? Ellsworth blinked twice before praying they never got to that PowerPoint).

"Okay. Moving on to the packaging signal sequence, what we find is a disturbing change in the stern-loop structure here." Another click to a high contrast photograph. "Although significant observations still need to be made, the zinc-knuckle element in the NC protein seems to approximate a _psi_ sequence. Of course," he backtracked quickly, "these could also be merely shadows within the image frame. We still need to look at the x-ray diffraction data to make sure."

Gerald glanced around at the disturbed expressions throughout the room. "What exactly is a _psi_ sequence?"

"A genome packaging signal." The look Tom received indicated that his colleague was interested in a more complete answer. "…Often associated with retroviral axis assembly," he finished reluctantly.

"Retroviral." The other's frown deepened. "You mean HIV?"

"There are…other retroviruses in the field. HTLV, for one."

"Which causes T-cell lymphoma," Lansing pointed out.

A look of irritation crossed Tom's face. "This is only one of the structural similarities! There are a number of very good reasons for the construction scheme to imitate a retroviral sequence, yet still result in a perfectly normal influenza A virus." He regretted making the comment now, of mere academic interest, which his colleagues were blowing completely out of proportion by the grim expressions around the table.

"Then, why don't you stop dwelling on the details and tell us how to treat it?"

Tom took a deep breath. "The catalytic blackout we believe to be merely a turning point in viral activity. Length of infection normally spans two weeks, with the first centering primarily on general flu symptoms – low-grade fever, headache, aggravated cough. However, once the blackout occurs, accompanied by sudden dehydration, disease progression quickens until respiratory arrest. If we're to treat this virus effectively, then our best target time frame is the window between catalyst and severe illness onset."

"Why not earlier?"

"Because no diagnostic criterion exists of yet to distinguish superflu earlier." Tom plucked agitatedly at the corner of his briefing folder, already creased several times over into dog ears. "Up until now, our tests can only track broad-spectrum infection beforehand."

"Wait, so you're saying you can't tell the difference between regular flu and this new virus?" Ellsworth asked incredulously.

"The characterization schemes are incredibly similar." Roskin frowned at the other scientists around the table. Didn't anyone here hold a degree in virology? "It's not a simple antigen set, or else we wouldn't see such high mortality rates."

"On that note, what are the numbers right now?" Gerald asked, hoping to move the subject to a more understandable – and socially pertinent – area.

"Four dead, sixty in isolation, another hundred and twenty-five held within local quarantine. The number infected has grown by twelve percent since yesterday."

Sam's face was grave at the last statistic. "There's got to be some prophylactic measures to reduce those figures." He glanced back at Tom. "What kind of treatments are we looking at?"

"The usual regimes. Amantadine, rimantadine, oseltamivir. Acetaminophens for fever control." Roskin waved a hand in the air, as if they were all utterly obvious and utterly useless remedies. By the sound of things, that was probably true. "We've tried…several vaccine combinations so far, but it's – the antigenic shift has – " He started pacing in frustrated anger. "There is no simple method to generate the antibodies! None at all! This is at minimum a Level 3 virus of high mortality and unknown origin, structured for maximal contagion range. Our frying eggs are all in one pan, now. We've really hopped into the fire this time!" His eyes gleamed wide, frenzied, and a mood of general panic seemed to creep into the room along with his agitated gait.

"Calm down, Roskin." Sam didn't look particularly calm himself. A Level 3 in a major metropolitan area? This was like Ebola Reston all over again. "Let's look at the epidemiology first before we jump to any conclusions."

"In terms of epidemiology, this virus exhibits a disturbingly anomalous spread." Lansing coughed, then indicated the rapidly rising peaks on her chart. "We've already established that two index cases form the bulk of the transmission ratio, but they don't explain how initial locus densities arose so suddenly. It's completely outside our regression analysis."

"Have you accounted for the logarithmic range? Aligned the axes?"

She shook her head. "It's not a methodological error."

"Given this virus's camouflage capabilities, it's clearly a problem with our radar."

"You mean…the detection scheme?" Maria translated the military metaphor for the rest of them.

Sam nodded curtly. "Tom gave us a rundown of the stage statistics earlier. _Infection_ onset was not sudden. This thing went guerrilla on us in the flu season, allowed it to spread unnoticed for God knows how long before the first case attracted notice." _Just my shit luck. Even viruses learned from 'Nam._

"Yes, the trend does indicate a prior variable." Lansing frowned, pecking at her laptop on which was drawn the epidemiological data that the EIS had forwarded to all of them. A dense spreadsheet of numbers was accompanied by several scatter plots in Excel, regression equations pulled up on one side. She made a few adjustments to her model, entered the code, and then ran the simulation again. "The cluster formations seemed spontaneous at first, but mapped with regular influenza patterns, they could roughly approximate a logarithmic function." She turned the screen around so everyone at the table could see the new graph.

"And now that the topology is stabilizing…" Fingers flying, she made the same changes to several other 3D visualizations as well. "…it's falling into a general radial distribution." Lansing pushed up her glasses in satisfaction. "We'll need to do a few recalculations, but this should greatly improve our tracking."

"That'll be useful to Wu, but I need the estimates right now if we're going to talk about quarantine logistics," Maria said. "The state department isn't about to wait on another round of data analysis."

"Well, what are our options at the moment?"

She started ticking them off on her fingers. "Hospital's already quarantined, local areas under watch, the board's debating whether to shut down the entire city up in Princeton. Orlando has begun limiting interstate travel, but no official word on border control yet."

"We should definitely close the airports," Ron said. "This thing's ravaged two cities in only a week, who knows where it'll go if we don't cut off its next step?"

"There's still not enough evidence to justify a complete shutdown, though. The WHO's been contacted about the international situation. We should wait on their response before making any further moves." Gerald argued the path of least public panic.

The state liaison nodded along in agreement. "I still say we need to implement some health screening procedures before the infection gets out of hand."

"That'll all be arranged," Maria replied calmly. "And as much as I respect the WHO, Watson, I think there's plenty of reason right now for limiting all travel within thirty miles of the quarantine area." She tapped her pen, point down, on the map of the hot zones before her. "Our biggest problem right now isn't stopping people from leaving, it's identifying this virus _before_ it makes leaving a viable choice." She glanced to her left. "Roskin?"

Tom's eyes were fixed on a complex medical chart. "The incubation period is approximately three days. However, since first stage symptoms are slight to undetectable, you could extend that to well beyond a week."

"What are the chances that a non-infected person quarantined with an infected person will contract the illness?"

"Significantly higher. Judging by transmission within the limited population, almost one hundred percent."

The others glanced at each other worriedly. "You mean…given the statistical data we have right now," Sam suggested. "That figure will be adjusted as we see more clusters arise."

"No." Tom shoved deliberately at his non-existent spectacles. "I mean taking the limit of the population density graph."

_Oh. Obtuse mathematical jargon._

"Well, what's the current contagion rate?"

"Not good," Lansing said from her place by her laptop. "Of the twenty-five people who came into contact with the first patient zero, nineteen have already developed stage two symptoms, and another seven are progressing rapidly into respiratory distress."

Sam did the calculations quickly in his head. "Jesus. That's an infection rate of almost – "

" – eighty percent," she finished for him. "And these were just the ones within passing association. If we narrow it down to long-term contacts, the percentage peaks even higher." She didn't bother pointing out exactly how high. Tom had made that computation already.

Gerald shook his head. "We can't justify putting healthy people into quarantine with those statistics."

"But the diagnostic tests are all inconclusive. There's just no way to tell for sure whether a patient is infected or not under these conditions."

"No, it's perfectly clear. What isn't clear is whether those infected have the flu or the superflu in their system."

That gave them all a sobering pause.

"Then, it's even worse!" Gerald yelled through the silence. "Throw someone whose immune system is already wrecked in with this thing, and you're sure to see even more infection."

"And if we let one case free?" Schlessinger asked in challenge. "There's thirteen thousand people in the metropolitan area, twenty-five major travel routes out. Assuming the shortest distance exit, any carrier will go through at least three bottleneck infection zones before moving past the tracking margin." She rattled off the statistics crisply as if they were a shopping list in her head. "That's thirty potential new patients you've got on your hands."

"Or one recovered person returning to their family."

"The stats aren't in your favor there, Watson," Sam remarked.

"So just cut our losses? Hope for the best?" The other's face had grown livid. "Because you're coming very close to suggesting that we simply round up anyone with a high white blood count and toss them into the bubble room."

"If that's what it takes to stop this thing from spreading, then we're going to have to do it," Maria finally snapped.

The frigid silence that followed left a heavy pall over the meeting room.

"The best…we have right now is the catalytic blackout. It's the, the closest we've come to a definitive symptom." Ironically, Tom was the first to speak up, a nervous twitch tugging at the edge of his lips. He looked around tentatively, subdued, feeling not a little guilty for being the cause of all this. After all, it was his failure to produce a diagnostic test that caused them to descend into the murky world of cost-benefit politics. "I…My team and I, we're exploring some methods to narrow the selection down."

Ellsworth tipped his head in tired acknowledgement. "Then we'll go with that until something better arrives. Schlessinger has the resources, set up a screening center at every clinic in town and start separating out the cases." He paused. "If you have to, assume the worst for quarantine."

"We need to address public reaction," Gerald said stiffly, changing the subject to their least favorite topic of the day – quite a feat, considering how this day was turning out.

"There hasn't been any information yet about the virus released."

"Exactly. Which is why we need to provide it before speculation starts," Ron rationalized calmly. As the resident behaviorist, it seemed he was in charge of ensuring his colleagues didn't kill each other with the iciness of their glares. "People are going to ask, what is this thing? Where did it come from? How dangerous is it?" He gave Ellsworth an even look. "This isn't the military, Sam. You can only tide them over with 'bad flu season' for so long."

Any other person calling him Sam would've received a sharp rebuke, but in this case, Ellsworth knew the intimation was true. Didn't mean he liked it, though.

"So we send out a press release. Get the media on our side. As long as they have enough information to work with, they'll be happy to feed the twenty-four hour news cycle." Gerald was already jotting down his plans. "That takes care of the eighty percent of the population who get their health updates from CNN."

"It's not all going to be a walk in the park. There _will_ be some outlets who don't buy into the mainstream."

"Which is why you'll be dodging their questions."

"We don't know enough about this virus ourselves, how can we hope to provide accurate information to laymen?" Roskin cut in.

"By dumbing it down from a PhD thesis to a cereal box label," Gerald retorted pointedly. "For, you know, the rest of us who didn't do our postdoctorate work in molecular biology."

Ron sighed. "It won't be easy getting people to buy an explanation they don't understand."

"Right now, our most important goal is to _avoid mass panic_," Ellsworth interrupted the senseless quibbling. Great meetings always ended with everyone disagreeing with everyone else until he started giving out orders. "There isn't going to be another cholera in New York, or plague in San Francisco. We do this strictly, but we do it right, and with the cooperation of the public. Which means you three – " he indicated the EIS and PR factions before him. " – need to find a way to work together long enough to get the message out."

"And who's going to navigate the local news logistics?"

"That doesn't matter now." Sam closed his briefing book with an air of finality. "State's gonna have to deal with communication details once the big leagues moves in. What _we_ need to do is figure out how to stop this thing before it spreads any further." He turned to Tom. "Roskin, you're head of viral analysis. Contact the other government labs – NIH, USAMRIID, Hopkins – and work with them to figure out a definitive diagnostic tool first. No second guessing, I want a specific targeted approach to every patient we get."

Tom frowned. "That may not be possible with the current antigen structure."

"Well, give me the best that you can. And start mapping out some concrete treatment options." Sam tossed the heavy folder of medical files over for emphasis. It landed with a _whump_, narrowly missing the other's fingers. "If I hear another word of 'fluids and bed rest,' I'm going to throw the entire media circus out the window. Schlessinger," he snapped off military-style, swiveling sharply to face her. "Get ready for entire state border closure. No ands, ifs, or buts – tell them if they want to argue legalities, they can take it up with the WHO. We've got a deadly virus spreading at ninety percent transmission rate across two major metropolitan crossroads. If even a single infected case gets through, there's going to be hell to pay in the neighboring provinces."

"I'll gather resources in conjunction with the National Guard and state health facilities," she nodded briskly.

"Do that. And get the DoD to put you into contact with some military agencies, as well."

"As for the EIS…" he continued, "Wu will be in at about 0600 hours, so I want a full report with the latest developments uploaded to him before then. In the meantime, keep investigating the index case in Orlando – I'll get national security to set up a liaison with the Russian embassy – and find out what the overlap between regular flu and superflu in each state is." He cut the epidemiology official's protest off with a wave of his hand. "I know we don't have a definitive diagnostic yet, but use your simulation models. Roskin will be in touch with a better test as soon as possible." Ellsworth glanced at both parties to ensure that they understood his orders. It was a bullshit move, really, placing each at the behest of the other. EIS couldn't do much without the necessary tools, and Tom hated pressure from other departments, especially when he was already forced to wade neck deep in inter-agency politics. At least Lynn was over at USAMRIID…

But, temporary measures for temporary problems. Once John got here, they could revisit things with a much keener eye.

"We need to move fast on this thing, and prepare for every contingency." His eyes roved sharply around the room. "One mistake could FUBAR the entire operation."

A tentative voice piped up, "And what will we tell the press?"

Sam glanced in that direction. Ah, yes. PR. "Tell them whatever you want, so long as it doesn't interfere with our teams on the ground."

"People are going to want an answer for where this thing came from."

"Well, that's too bad, because I don't have any," he snapped in irritation.

"We need to ensure the public is well-informed," Ron explained patiently. "Of the consequences of their actions, that is. If they don't know anything, then they're going to be afraid, and if they're afraid, then they're going to make up their own theories about this virus."

"We can't allow false propaganda to be spread in the vacuum," Gerald added with a frown, completely overlooking the irony of that statement. "No one's sure yet if this is the seasonal flu, or if it's something else."

Tom looked distracted. "It's definitely something else."

"And what would that be?"

"A preliminary scan shows multiple antigenic clusters with – "

Ellsworth was shaking his head. "You'll only make it worse with medical jargon." He gave a loud sigh. "Look. This might be something new. Or, it might just be a very unique case of…a regular flu mutation. 1918 was deadly, but completely treatable – it was the government who did a bad job of managing facilities and made everything worse. If we keep our heads level about us, keep the _public's_ head level, then chances are we can mitigate what damage has already been done, as well as aid our own efforts on the ground."

They all considered, and nodded silently in agreement.

"So, seasonal flu it is then. Not a word on exact mutations or origins." Sam looked to each member of the board for direct acknowledgement, lingering especially long on Ron. The shrink. Never did trust those when he was in the military. At least this one worked with EIS, so he had a handle on things…just never could figure out what they really were thinking behind all the mindfuck. "Tell people there are various treatments in use that have proven effective against aggressive flu, but they should only visit the hospital for severe cases." That should help both epidemiology in identifying the worst of the strain, and Schlessinger in keeping logistics in check during quarantine. "Otherwise, over-the-counter medicine is their best, and safest, bet."

He waved a hand, about to adjourn the meeting.

"And what will you be doing?" a voice asked suddenly.

The sharp gaze Sam threw in his direction made Tom regret posing the question.

"Preparing to brief the President of the United States."

--o--

Events don't always occur quite in the order they are supposed to, but in this case, things fell neatly by the roadside as the entire nation heaved, rose up, and realized the truly dire state of affairs unfolding rapidly across its eastern landscape.

In the air over Nigeria, a laptop screen flashed dimly as an e-mail found its way into the inbox of Dr. John Wu.

On the outskirts of Millburn, National Guardsmen readied themselves to extend the quarantine throughout New Jersey.

In the quarantine room at Orlando, a nurse watched silently as another body was tagged by the CDC officials and removed to the growing stack in the morgue. She did not notice a balding man behind her steal away with two nondescript files.

By a metro phone booth, anxious lines formed waiting desperately for a call from their loved ones.

Near the capitol, several words were exchanged between men with dark sunglasses and Armani suits.

In the White House, a top secret briefing folder was delivered to the President's desk.

And at Princeton-Plainsboro Teaching Hospital, a single cane twirled slowly, evenly in its owner's gnarled white hands…casting shadow puppets across the walls.

--o--

Ten of them, total.

Ten patients on ten different treatment regimes, all in the beginnings of stage two superflu symptoms.

He had their charts tacked up on his wall by now, having run out of space on the whiteboard (even bringing out the old clear one – chipped after a St. Patrick's Day drinking session – he had barely enough room for five), and sent his three subordinates out to gather more tests surreptitiously, so Cuddy wouldn't notice. Not that, given the state of the hospital, she had time to worry about House's shenanigans. The CDC presence had been lessening these past few days, only to be replaced by a more ominous set of "security" officials in dark suits and upturned earpieces, their sum total communication consisting of approximately three words rattled off with blank indifference. He saw little of them, yet was fairly sure they had every person here down to the letter.

Turning his thoughts from the rather depressing hospital situation, House scanned once more the patient he'd come down here to observe. Thirty-two year old female of Hispanic descent, admitted three days ago with a bronchial infection. While here, developed a mild fever and aggravated cough, even after being treated successfully with antibiotics. Thanks to some quick footwork on Chase's part and Cameron's minor in Spanish, he was able to get her in on 500 milligrams of IV acyclovir beneath the hospital radar, one of several drugs he'd been juggling with as an alternative to the usual flu medicine – which, frankly, wasn't doing shit against this thing anyway. A combination of corticosteroids and albuterol, on the other hand, had at least been somewhat effective in slowing the lung infiltration which led to shock and respiratory arrest in most patients. And while House hated treating by the symptoms alone, he had to admit it was the only practical option at this point.

Out of the corner of his eye, he caught Wilson talking to a cancer patient through the gauze blue curtains.

"Sir, if you could please step away from the isolation zone."

House gave the security official a sparing glance before turning his gaze back to his subject. "I'm a doctor here."

"Can I see some ID?"

"Sorry, don't carry dog tags with me on a routine spying mission."

"Then I'm going to have to ask you to return to the _civilian_ waiting area in the lobby." Was that a hint of emphasis he detected in the monotone voice? House couldn't be sure, but the firm hand on his shoulder suggested he better make his decision quick, or he'd find it made rather painfully for him.

He opted, as always, for the latter.

"Look, don't you have some better cripples to harass?" House snapped caustically. Blue eyes flashed with more than customary annoyance. "I'm sure that Area 51 conspiracy left a couple of guys on the first – " Suddenly, the stat monitors started beeping inside the isolation room, and a flurry of movement rushed by them through the doorway. House turned to see a patient gasping, hands clasped to chest, while several nurses rounded the hospital bed, grabbing quickly for the crash cart. Intubation devices were removed. Pumps held out. One nurse ducked briefly for a syringe, allowing House to catch a glimpse of half of the patient's face. A Hispanic face.

The one who was supposedly getting better.

_Shit._ Whirling on his cane, House limped quickly off toward his office.

The glass door swung open, narrowly missing a stack of files balanced on the edge of his bookcase, and the momentary breeze caused the papers tacked on the walls – profiles of his ten test patients – to ruffle skywards. He snatched a pen from his desk, cap popping, to slash two dark X's over the bottom half of his notes on a…Linda Sanchez, it seemed. He cursed silently. He'd put Chase on her just in case there was any improvement, but chances were, the alcyclovir was another lead in the trash. Another dead end. Too many symptoms, not enough meds. No matter how many bulletproof vests he wrapped up around the lungs, the holes always managed to get through. Bloodstream was…bloodstream…

House stopped, eyes closing for a second, as he reorganized his thoughts.

_Three down. Two in the air. Five more without any improvement._

His cane clattered loudly, as he sank into a chair. Not enough patients, was more like it. As for Wilson…his mind flickered back to the glimpse he caught beyond the blue curtain. Still somewhere in the middle. Chills and dizziness, but fever was holding low with only mild swelling around the lymph nodes. The inflammation was cause for concern, though…if the next round of tests from patient number six came back negative, then he might prescribe that corticosteroid to help ease the breathing.

_At least he still has the energy to go mining for the needy,_ House thought bitterly, spinning an eraser in one hand. _Must be vampiric heaven with all those dying people in there._

Although, that wasn't quite true. If the woman House saw was a cancer patient, then she'd have to be immunosuppressed, which meant that if she had the superflu, she'd be at least in the ICU ward by now. Not chatting up some oncologist by her bedside. Of course, with the delays between blackout and ARDS fluctuating all the time, it might've been possible for someone like Wilson to –

House shook his head. He was grasping at dead ends.

Shoving the papers on his desk aside, his eyes fell on the cell phone lying next to his coffee mug. No new calls on there, either. He snorted. People were lining up to use the one government-secured phone to call their families, and here he was with an empty call log in front of him. No messages from Fletcher. That last one seemed to be a goner. Further tries to the number he'd gotten on redial only served up a polite machine voice telling him to go fuck himself (metaphorically). House suspected Fletcher had lost his cell phone right around the same time the officials figured out he wasn't quite the innocent bystander he pretended to be.

Which…didn't change their situation one bit. With a sigh, House moved on from twirling the eraser to bouncing one of his juggling balls against the far wall. Afternoon light streamed in from the window against an eerily silent, still background. Normally, this would be the time when the early birds drove off, and the late shift started streaming into the parking lot. Now, however, time seemed to stand in stasis. Not even the dump truck hauled by with its gratingly loud _wham_s against the garbage disposal.

_Next thing you know, the parents'll stop calling, too._

If they'd called his by now restricted landline access. Mom was probably worried, trying to reach him at the office. Dad had a handle on things with the military. If worst came to worst, there'd be people to take care of them. He considered giving them a call, then immediately ditched the idea when he imagined the awkward mess of emotions over the phone connection. No, they were safe in Vermont, and he was as good as he could get here. Nothing more needed to be said.

Except –

Abruptly, House snatched up his cell phone and punched in the speed dial. There was one person who definitely needed a shove in the right direction (out of the state) because her husband sure wasn't bright enough to figure out that the local quarantine was about to extend a whole lot farther within the next twenty-four hours.

…Predictably, it was Mark who answered the phone.

"Hello?"

"Where's Stacy?" House minced no words.

"Stacy?" A pause. Suspicion grew almost palpably through the earpiece. "What do you want with Stacy?"

"Need to talk to her," House said, not missing a beat. "What are _you_ doing on her private cell phone?"

"I don't think I owe you an explanation as to how I came to obtain my wife's cell phone," Mark replied stiffly, retreating into the realm of passive-aggressive non-answers at House's accusatory tone. A side effect of living with a lawyer for so long. The double talk started to rub off on you. "Stacy's not available," he stated with an air of smug satisfaction, the kind limited only to complete lies and convenient half-truths.

"Right," House snapped, losing his patience, "and you're just the switchboard operator. Running interference, in case the big bad stalker comes prowling around in the middle of the night." He caught himself before he could go any further and turn this petty quarrel into a dial tone ringing permanently in his ear. "Mark." The word carried a weight of dead seriousness. "This is important."

"Oh, I see." Not to be outdone by faux sincerity, it was Mark's turn to play up the sarcasm. "Well, since it's a matter of life and death, I'm sure the gallant doctor will just come limping to her rescue this very – "

A quick scuffle of the phone cut him off mid-sentence, and then, Stacy's voice came onto the line. "Greg?"

"Stacy, you need to get out of New Jersey."

"Wait – what?" Confusion tinged her voice. "Why?"

House continued on as if he hadn't been interrupted. "Go to New York, Virginia, visit your mother in Boston. Tell them you're going on vacation for a few weeks. Just stay out of Jersey."

"Greg, I'm not…" She stopped, seeming to gather her thoughts. "What's going on? Why do I have to get out of town?"

A muffled sigh came from the other end of the line. "There's been an epidemic, and it's spreading faster than syphilis in a whorehouse."

"An epidemic? You mean the flu season I've been hearing about?"

"Yes, and no." House ditched metaphors for a direct analogy. "This thing is to the flu what Superman is to Bozo the Epileptic Clown. Things are much worse than the reports have been telling you." _And more dangerous than anyone so far had suspected_.

"Wait, so why are you still in Princeton? If it's that bad, you should be leaving too," Stacy said, worry evident in her voice. "It's an epidemic, not some mysterious illness for you to diagnose." She paused, realizing that House had never told her exactly _what_ disease this epidemic was about. "Don't tell me it's both."

It most certainly was both, but House declined to comment on just how close Stacy had hit the mark. "I'm still here because the CDC's quarantined the entire hospital, and they're going to extend the perimeter around the whole city in about twenty-four hours, which is why you have to _leave_ right now." His voice rose at the last line, and a trace of aggravation crept into his tone. Twenty-four hours minus two hours driving time, one hour packing, three to four hours at the airport…did not leave much space for pointless prattling. Life would be so much easier if he didn't have to waste half of it convincing people of the right choice.

House stopped in his pacing to lean heavily against his cane. "And yeah, no one knows what this thing is."

"Oh, my God." Stacy gasped. "They've quarantined you? But you're okay, right? Over at the hospital?"

"...Two of the patients so far have died."

The long silence almost had him hoping that he'd gotten through to her.

Stacy exhaled loudly into the speaker. "I…I can't just leave. _Mark_ and I can't just leave." She rubbed at her forehead, shifting the phone to her other shoulder as she wavered between hesitancy and resignation. "What am I supposed to tell him? Oh, honey, the good doctor called and recommended we get out of town for a month, so I suppose that means you'll have to miss your rehab and we'll both have to drop our work. But don't worry, the rest of the country will be too panicked over the flu to notice."

"Hmm. Sounds good to me," House said brightly. "There's a flight leaving for Logan this afternoon, you'd better catch it before they close down the airports."

"Of course, Mark will completely agree to that rationale." Her dry tone echoed tension, which dropped as soon as she sighed.

Maybe this was an epidemic. A genuine emergency. House had rarely been wrong about medical matters in the past, and even when he was, proved more perceptive of the situation than any other doctors around him. It was how he got through med school with just the barest of effort, and how he won her over despite a distinct lack of...conventional charm. If there was something more to this than just a bad flu season, then he would be the first to know.

And yet – Stacy couldn't quite bring herself to believe the warning. Trust was one thing, truth another, as House was fond of saying. No, it wasn't so much trust as…as Greg's pathology. Something she'd become all too familiar with in their years together. Distractions…puzzles…reading unconsciously into minute details. He _needed_ mental toys to play with. People only knew him for his medical genius, his unerring diagnostic instincts, but they never saw the times when House's single-minded pursuit got him into more trouble than it was worth…especially in areas he couldn't claim expertise. Their relationship...

Like a true lawyer, Stacy grasped for the remaining stray straws. "Are you sure this isn't a false alarm? With all the bioterrorism threats, the CDC is probably overreacting."

Of all the straws she could have drawn, this was the one that broke the cripple's cane.

"Right, the same way the hospital overreacted to the false alarm that was my leg," House snapped back without a hint of hesitation.

The silence that followed was almost audible.

"…I'll think about it." A strained pause. "All right?"

"There's nothing to think about!" House yelled, no longer caring where this conversation ended up so long as it involved Stacy leaving. "Either you take a plane out of New Jersey now, or you stay here for a few more days, get caught in the quarantine, and learn about the epidemic firsthand from some nice, polite government officials in biosafety suits." He rubbed a hand down the side of his face, barely able to control his frustration. The rasp of skin on whiskers seemed to mimic the harsh grate of his voice.

"Trust me," he said quietly, head pressed against the window glass. "This last time."

"I trust you to believe in what you're saying."

The dial tone rang in his ear for a good thirty seconds before he put the phone down.

--o--

It was a wonder the phone didn't die on him, given the number of times he'd hit redial on the keypad.

Wilson put the handset down in resignation, knowing that any further attempts would just waste his time and extend the line further down the hallway. Already, several more patients had arrived to take advantage of the opportunity to call their family and friends, inform them of their situation. These were the "best" cases – by now, the containment room couldn't hold anymore superflu patients, so the healthier ones were moved to a separate wing – the ones that hadn't progressed yet beyond stage two. Wilson was probably on the borderline at this point, but his position at the hospital got him bumped up. Not that it did much good. All he got to see was a slightly lighter shade of green on the walls and the absence of a glass food slot.

It was strange, walking the familiar Mathey Wing in a hospital gown and slippers. They'd moved the cancer patients and immunocompromised as far from the potential area of infection as possible, in an attempt to lessen the danger to them. But that still ignored the fact that all of Princeton-Plainsboro was under quarantine, and, given the communicability of this virus, was probably only the beginning of the government containment.

The appearance of CDC officials from the outside, clad in biosafety suits, only drove the point home further.

"Call with Julie?" A familiar voice by his side shook him out of his thoughts.

"More like an attempted call." Wilson sighed and settled back onto his hospital bed. "She's apparently refusing to answer anything from me." He ignored the fact that he'd been calling from the general hospital line, which wouldn't have shown up on caller ID.

"Well, that would be quite a mind-reading accomplishment, seeing as how you're calling from the hospital phone." House, as usual, saw right through his fib.

"Yeah. That did occur to me." Wilson rubbed at the back of his neck, eyes sliding to one side. Sometimes, he wished his friend weren't quite so perceptive. "It also occurred to me that I'd rather she hate me than be sick." A crease appeared across his pale forehead (_How many days had it been since he'd seen the outside? Five? Six?_), as he struggled with the implications of that thought. "Of course, it's probably a combination of both."

"More likely is…she left when she saw the CDC warning on the news and didn't bother to leave a callback number," House observed with his customary bluntness. This time, the cynicism was warranted. "People tend to forget things when they're running for their lives."

The idea of a loved one, even so estranged as Julie, abandoning any semblance of their relationship in the middle of a crisis was not something Wilson found easy to accept. That she had known he worked at the hospital made it that much worse. He wasn't expecting any Hollywood movie reunions (three divorces had taken care of that), but at the very least…he'd hoped…she'd thought enough of him to remember.

Wilson shook his head faintly and changed the subject. "How about you, did you reach Stacy? I know you've called her by now."

House blinked, not a little surprised "Have you been tapping my cell phone?" he asked mock-accusingly. "The NSA's already got the goods, but I figure they'd wait another couple of years before selling me out to my best friend."

"Well, unfortunately, in exchange for getting the goods early, I'm not able to listen in on the conversations," Wilson replied with a ghost of a smile. He did not overlook the significance of House's last word.

"So you can track them without the added guilt of deliberate eavesdropping…" House tilted his head to one side, eyes narrowing in dry amusement. "Nice. It's like blackmailing Cuddy."

Wilson sighed in exasperation, about to reply, when he was cut off by a cough. The spasm shook his frame and burned at the back of his throat, bringing with it a now-familiar metallic taste in his mouth. It felt like swallowing pennies. Detachedly, he noticed that the pain in his chest had grown worse since last time.

_Blood in sputum with respiratory involvement can indicate a wide variety of primary infections, including, but not limited to, tuberculosis, pneumonia, and acute pulmonary hemosiderosis…_ The words echoed back at him from a long-forgotten lecture in medical school.

"You would know, of course," Wilson remarked weakly, after the fit had subsided. He took the cup of water House offered him without any comment. "What did Stacy say? Did you tell her about the quarantine?"

"Yeah." House tilted his head in affirmation, but did not look at his friend. "She said she'd think about it. Was afraid of what to tell Mark."

Wilson nodded slowly. "At least they're both okay." He hesitated. "You...didn't tell her about me, did you?"

House turned a shrewd glance on him. "You're worried how she'll take this incident."

"Being deathly ill is not something you really want advertised." Wilson paused, and shook his head. "I'd rather people not know how I'm doing."

The blue eyes roved over him pensively, unanswering, their focus seeming to turn inward as House searched his countenance for an answer. Reason. People who need to be needed hate being on the helpless end of things themselves. It wasn't about control. It was guilt. Unconscious responsibility. They would rather fight it alone than let others add to the weight of their burden by emotional involvement…and that was Wilson's pathology. He actually thought if others tried to fix him, he'd lose his ability to care.

House said nothing, but it was clear from the way his lip twitched that he saw more in that one statement than Wilson cared to reveal. The relief that came with this realization was oddly comforting.

"That can be arranged," his friend replied lightly, as if unworried about the consequences. "Though…I wouldn't call it deathly. Deathly is Lassa fever in the middle of plague-stricken Africa." He gestured to one side with his cane. "Hemorrhagic fever _and_ your bathroom's backed up. Now that's hell on Earth."

"So does that make this purgatory on Earth?" Wilson asked. "Or is there no category because no one still has any idea what 'this' is?"

"It's not Lassa fever."

"Yes, I think we've managed to narrow it down that much," he replied with a touch of sarcasm.

"Not pneumonia, not plague, _definitely_ not eastern equine encephalitis..." It was obvious that House was stalling, counting off more and more absurd diseases on one hand.

"So after that arduous process of elimination...what's the answer?"

A pause, this one shorter, and his gaze flicked back to the hospital bracelet on Wilson's wrist. It was blue. For quarantine.

"...I don't know."

--o--

The only source of light was a little lamp in the corner. In a way, it almost made the conference room look cozy, despite everything else that had happened. Almost. Through the glass windows, Cameron could see Chase slouched and fast asleep in one of the chairs, a book splayed across his lap. A teeth-marked pencil had been dropped carelessly by his feet. Foreman was in another chair, adjacent. In his hands was a newspaper. The sports section had been tossed on the center table.

She pushed open the door and eased it shut behind her, careful not to wake Chase up. Her attempt was successful up until she walked straight into a small stack of files she hadn't noticed in the dark. The papers collapsed with a thump that nearly echoed in the dead silence. She froze, as though she'd just committed a terrible crime and glanced guiltily at the startled Chase.

"Oh. Hey." Chase rubbed at his eyes, and looked at his watch. It seemed he couldn't register the numbers because the next words out of his mouth were, "What time is it?"

"1:30 a.m." She offered him a tired smile. "Sorry for waking you up."

"There's coffee in the pot if you want," Foreman said, eyes not moving from his newspaper.

"Thanks." Cameron was already heading in that direction. As she picked up the half-empty pot, she turned to Chase. "Do you want any?"

"Coffee, I want _and_ need." His voice was slightly muffled from leaning his chin in the palm of his hand. "It's like med school all over again, only twice as bad."

"Except in med school, we actually _knew_ what we were dealing with. Even the experts can't find an answer key here." Foreman closed the newspaper and tossed it on the floor amidst the patient files. The thick, bold _Superflu Ravages City_ headline glared up at them in the darkness.

"That's because there is no answer key," Chase said, accepting the mug of coffee from Cameron with a nod of thanks. "The superflu's off the map. They just won't say it because then everyone would fall into mass hysteria."

"Superflu? Is that what they're calling it now?" Cameron asked. She sat herself down in a chair by the conference table.

"Seems like it."

As if to prove Chase's reply, Foreman picked up the newspaper again and held out the front page to her. "That's what the reporters have been saying, since no one else has come up with a better diagnosis than the flu."

Cameron took the paper with a hesitant hand. The more her eyes skimmed the article, the more her brow knitted. "Twenty dead? And the quarantine's around all of Princeton now. This can't be just the seasonal flu!" she insisted, as if they hadn't established that fact already. "We've seen those patients - they're young, strong, perfectly healthy individuals."

"Hence, _super_flu," Chase said. "Also, you forgot what happened in 1918."

Cameron only frowned further. "That was because of government ineptitude. The military was more interested in running its war than ensuring its facilities were clean."

"Was?" Chase didn't do so, but Cameron's mind ended up filling in the raised eyebrow to match his tone. "There's a nice war going on right now, too, that the military would be more interested in than keeping things tidy."

"Our facilities are still ten times cleaner than they were over eighty years ago even _with_ negligence," Foreman said.

"But the government is now ten times better than they were eighty years ago at hiding their negligence," Chase pointed out. "Either way, this virus came from somewhere and it's obviously very deadly."

There was a quiet, but sharp bang as Cameron set her coffee cup on the table. "Only deadly to some. Other people seem to have immunity."

"_Seem_ being the key word," said Foreman. "No one still knows anything."

"Yeah, and some people are still convinced it's the regular flu and won't check in," Chase said, voice tinged with exasperation. "Which is entirely not helping anyone."

Cameron was shaking her head. "They can't tell the difference. How could they? Not even House could tell the difference in the beginning."

"Well, yes, but at this point, you'd think they'd be erring on the side of caution."

"Denial is the M.O. for most people when it comes to illness. My dad won't go see the doctor, either," Foreman said.

Cameron turned to him. "You called him?"

"Yeah. Earlier in the day. I caught him coughing and told him to go to the hospital, but you know how he is. And he won't leave mom by herself."

Chase paused. Then, feeling like he ought to say something, "There have been a couple of cases where people really do just have the regular flu." He failed to mention that one of those two lapsed into the superflu afterwards.

"If they get better, maybe there's a chance they can develop resistance to both strains..." As Cameron spoke, her voice faded off until it was almost a whisper by the end. It was a nonsensical theory, and she knew it. But it sounded so much like a plausible solution that she felt almost cheated it wasn't occurring in reality.

"More likely that the virus will just die out somehow. Similar to what happened with the Spanish flu." It was a shiny card of optimism thrown out by Chase. No sooner had it landed out there for all to consider, Foreman tore it to shreds.

"Also similar," he said, "millions of people will die before that happens. Odds say that includes people we know or even us."

"None of us have gotten sick yet," Cameron replied. "If we were the first ones exposed, why aren't we sick like the rest of the patients?"

"Actually, nothing says we were the first," Chase said. "For anyone can tell, Michael could've been infected by another friend, student, family member. There's no index case."

"Still, it's unusual. Even without being the first, we were nevertheless exposed fairly early on, at least, in regards to the rest of New Jersey. So why aren't we sick?" Cameron demanded. It almost seemed like she thought she could force some logic into the situation by playing Devil's advocate. "For that matter, why is Dr. Wilson, and not one of us, sick? He had five minutes of contact with the patient."

"Too many variables," Foreman said. "This isn't anything we've ever seen before."

"Including the fact that House finally has a patient he cares about," Chase added.

A heavy silence descended over them right on cue. For a moment, Chase looked as though he wished he hadn't brought that up. He didn't know Dr. Wilson well, but the oncologist was a close — and only — friend of House's. The superflu already hit too close to home, striking right in the heart of Princeton itself. With Wilson falling sick, the virus might as well have crawled into bed with them.

Cameron looked down. "He's been up all night for the past week staring at that whiteboard of his."

"You think House is still trying to solve this case?" Foreman glanced at his two coworkers, searching for confirmation. "He's a diagnostician, not a virologist. We already know what this thing is. The problem is, we don't have a cure."

"We may not have it, but House is convinced one exists," Chase said. "Until he finds it or the virus magically vanishes, he's not going to stop looking."

More silence as all three considered the slim likelihood of both options. Like steel to magnet, their eyes drifted over to the newspaper Cameron had set down by her elbow. The headline screamed silently back at them.

"Don't know about you guys," Foreman said finally, "but I'm personally hoping for the latter."

--o--

One state down. One on the way. When put into context of the fact that there were fifty-two states total, that really only made about two percent. Two percent was not a lot, technically. The phrase "two percent of the country is affected" carried almost no weight.

Which was why the media opted to announce things like, "the entire state of Florida" before throwing in some large statistical figures to induce even more panic.

Panic was something Sam Ellsworth honestly did not need at the moment. And while he didn't want to downplay things, because this _was_, actually, a situation worthy of hysteria...if it would help save him a headache or two right now, he'd take it.

_And now the politicians are arriving. Lord have mercy. If not on the people of New Jersey and Florida, then on me._

Ellsworth dreaded speaking with the various government factions. Never mind that he himself was a government faction. Throw in the President, along with his advisors _and_ the CIA, all demanding answers he didn't have right now was like asking to get his fingers crushed in a car door. Repeatedly. Some of these people even went so far as to argue the science, as though the virulence of a pathogen were _debatable_, like an ethical issue rather than a fact. Sam was pretty sure that if Congress decided epidemics, the Black Death would still be in session.

As the door clicked open, Ellsworth sat up straighter and neatened his notes while his team filed in. His attempt to look alert and on top of things was effective up until Howard Lynn gave him a knowing (and slightly sympathetic) look.

The four of them formed a semi-circle around the conference table, with Howard on his right, and Maria Schlessinger to his left, followed by Tom Roskin somewhere at the far end. Schlessinger was a practical lady, and she looked every bit the part of a statistician. In fact, she almost looked like a statistic herself – clear, prompt, and straightforward. Her hair was swept back in a neat bun that should've made her look older than her forty-something years, but in reality added to her charm. She had on a classy, pinstriped business suit. Next to her, Tom seemed even more out of place with his poorly tamed hair (though Ellsworth could tell he'd actually tried this time) and crooked, paisley tie.

Introductions were kept brief when the video conference began. Nobody wanted to dawdle, and Sam could tell that tensions were high. He was glad, though, that this at least had been kept as a video conference. An in-person conference tended to drag in more officials than needed to be there, and only added to the amount of hot air being blown around the room. Here, they'd cut down the number of attendees to just four outside of his own people: CIA Director Richard Kelly, the President, his Chief of Staff Wayne Palmer, Secretary of Defense William Nolan, and CDC Director Julie Gerberding.

For a moment, there was only silence. It happened often, lasted roughly thirty seconds, and was a result of not a single person wanting to begin the conversation.

Tom shifted. Sam cleared his throat.

The President spoke first. "What are the recent developments?"

"Of course." Ellsworth flipped through the brief notes jotted down through the first meeting. He could remember all that they discussed — nothing that had happened within the past four days would leave his memory, he was sure — but it didn't hurt to make sure. Besides, this bought him time to gather his thoughts and look more professional. Two birds, one stone.

In his mind's automatic attempt to distract, he wondered briefly what sort of mess Tom would've chopped _that_ particular metaphor into.

...Best get back to business.

"We're currently still attempting to determine the exact origins of the virus — "

"You mean you don't even know where it came from?" Kelly, ever the optimistic one, jumped in.

"What I mean is that we don't have a confirmed patient zero," Sam continued, biting back a sharp retort. "Reports do, however, point rather strongly to one Michael Falburg as the index case. Sixteen years old, originally diagnosed with blastomycosis at Princeton-Plainsboro. He was treated, deemed cured, and readmitted 48 hours later with severe respiratory distress. At 0200, he was pronounced dead. This was approximately one day before the virus's outbreak began."

Filler information. If someone was going to call him on — for lack of a better term — bullshitting, it would be the Agency's Director. Ellsworth was about to barrel on before that could happen, but it was too late. Kelly struck like a viper.

"So you don't know the origins of the virus _and_, considering you keep referring to it as 'the virus,' I take it you also don't know _what_ this virus even is?"

Ellsworth tried not to bristle. The discreet look Lynn shot him told him he'd failed. "This is a new pathogen. In that sense, we _do_ know what it is; what we don't know is how to cure it."

"How about diagnostic criteria, then?"

Ellsworth hesitated. "At the moment, the blackouts preceding the full strength of the infection and the timeframe in which the virus progresses are or only indicators." He could tell that they were waiting for more, as though scientific intelligence was any easier to gather than those of the national security type. Indeed, it was _harder_ even.

_We can't just throw pathogens into Guantanamo or feed them to Jack Bauer,_ he thought darkly.

But in the end, the big boys were the big boys, and Ellsworth had to give them something to chew on.

"There is," he began, "one characteristic of the virus — "

Tom perked up, irritated. "It isn't confirmed! I'd only put it out there as an interesting, academic point. As I'd mentioned earlier, we haven't made any definite conclusions on this yet through the x-ray diffraction data. Merely because the NC protein — or, more specifically, its zinc-knuckle element, that is — _does_ appear to have a —"

"There's a certain retroviral quality to the virus," Ellsworth cut in, before Tom could mention the words _psi sequence_, and shoot all of their feet in the process. No need to have the crickets chirping so early in the game. "As in, HIV."

At the word _HIV_, silence fell.

So much for avoiding crickets.

"There's no cure," Wayne Palmer said quietly. It wasn't a question.

"Not at the moment, no. There is the possibility of using oseltamivir — an antiviral – to combat the infection. However, our resources are limited and the success rate is not very high. What we need to focus on right now is damage control and containment, the latter of which would make a good segue way into our next topic of discussion."

"The quarantine, you mean." SecDef spoke for the first time.

"Yes. The one we have in place — "

"You've already extended it around Princeton," Kelly interrupted for the third time now. "You're saying it's still a concern?"

Are _you_ saying you'll be cutting me off throughout the rest of this meeting? Ellsworth bit down on that thought and replied instead, "That is correct. It is our recommendation that there be a full state quarantine put into place."

"You do realize the impact that a full quarantine will have on the people." Palmer this time. The one who wasn't the President.

_I also realize the impact that allowing this virus to spread will have on the people._

Oh, damn. His inner commentary was getting out of control. He really must be tired.

Ellsworth shifted the folder in front of him half an inch to the right, just to give himself something to do. He felt too stiff just sitting there and talking.

"Sir, the health impacts should we fail to contain the virus may very well far outweigh the social impacts of a quarantine." Lynn. God bless Lynn, apparently reading his friend's mind and giving what there was a healthy dose of diplomacy. Not that Ellsworth was entirely handicapped in that area, but it was always nice for someone else to do the work for him.

Besides, the faces onscreen had always taken more to Lynn. Ellsworth didn't really mind. The suits might not have liked him, but they damn well needed him. And perhaps he was just feeling spiteful because of the late hour, but it was _that_ last fact which he rather enjoyed.

"By 'full quarantine', I assume you mean the complete shutdown of borders and airports?" said the President.

Ellsworth nodded. "Yes, sir. I understand it may seem excessive, but I assure you that given the circumstances, it is the only possible way we can even remotely contain the virus."

Schlessinger took this as her cue to jump in with the statistics. "We've determined an eighty percent infection rate, with an incubation period of between three days to over a week, depending. This thing spreads as fast, if not faster, than your average flu."

"If we ring everyone in, that is potentially condemning even those uninfected to die," the President said.

Ellsworth hesitated. "Yes. If I may be frank, there are no _good_ choices here, sir. Just better ones." He paused, jaw steeling as he met each politician's gaze. This was the crucial point. Back when the Russian scare was big, this was where everything either broke or came together. Everything else afterward boiled down to logistics.

Lynn glanced at him. Ellsworth glanced back. He knew what Lynn was trying to say, but he wasn't about to mention any of that here. Not now. It was too early.

"Once we implement the quarantine, can't we begin determining who is safe to release and who is not?" Nolan asked.

"The main problem with the virus is that it is very, very similar to the regular flu, up until the patient hits stage four. At that point...there's nothing more that can be done."

"So you're suggesting that we place one large bubble over the entire state of New Jersey. No one leaves, no one gets in, regardless of health."

"That is precisely what I am suggesting. Anyone with an abnormal spike in their white count will be detained."

"We'll need a surge of security along the borders and inland," SecDef said with characteristic pragmatism. Sam thanked his lucky stars for having another military veteran on the board – someone who knew cost-benefit – to set the other politicians into line. "How long do you think?"

Schlessinger shook her head. "There's no length of time at this point. Not even an estimate. There are too many variables. Scientists still don't know why the influenza of 1918 died out the way it did."

"If you don't mind me steering the conversation away for a bit," Kelly said, "what of Orlando?"

"Specifically what about Orlando?" Ellsworth asked.

"It is my knowledge that viruses tend to spread forward, not jump clear over several states, do they not?"

"It…is an anomaly."

Tom lifted a hesitant finger in the air. "We believe the explanation may be that there are two patient zeroes, not one."

For a moment, Sam waited expectantly for Roskin to stumble down his usual path of scientific ramblings, but for once, Tom stopped there.

"Two," Kelly repeated. "Who's the other?"

Ellsworth shuffled through his notes. "At the moment, he has yet to be identified. What we do know is that he's forty-four years old of Russian origin — " A photo of the patient appeared onscreen right on cue. " — and appears to be the first case in Florida, if not the first case overall. He was admitted before the boy was. However, both died at the same time, which can mean any number of things – the virus our John Doe contracted was a milder strain, the patient was more resilient, possibly due to his military background, or the virus has more variables than we expected."

If the faces onscreen had been sitting together, they would've exchanged looks with each other. As it was, everyone just glanced down and then back up again.

"So you're saying this...superflu has somehow manifested in two areas at the same time," Palmer reiterated.

"It's a bit of a coincidence, I know."

"Do coincidences happen often in science?" Kelly remarked sarcastically.

"What might you be suggesting?" Lynn asked.

"We have a virus that has seemingly come out of nowhere. Up until this point, we've assumed that this virus has manifested via natural means, but I would say that there is a strong possibility that that may not be the case after all."

"You're saying...this virus was created on purpose?"

"I'm saying it was created _and_ released on purpose."

Silence. Then –

"That's a bit of a leap, Richard," Palmer admonished.

"I must agree," Ellsworth said. "There's no real evidence to suggest — "

Kelly leaned forward. "You've yet to be able to determine its origins and you must admit that, given all of your careful monitoring of pathogens, you would've noticed the shift, correct?"

Sam couldn't deny that last point without admitting in front of the President that they might've been less than careful these last few weeks, and the Director damn well knew it. Manipulative son of a bitch. "That is correct," he replied stiffly.

"Then you agree it _is_ a possibility."

"Possibility is very different from plausibility. This may be an anomaly, but it does not automatically point to foul play. As is often the case with scientific inquiry, we might've simply not discovered the answer yet." Ellsworth looked at Tom, and then instantly regretted it when Tom gave an immediate nod of agreement and began speaking.

"It's abnormal, but it could also be easily caused by an antigenic shift. Shifts are less common than your seasonal drifts of this kind, but they are in no way rare, as all that is truly required for one to occur is that two separate influenza strains infect a host simultaneously. Then, you have the typical genetic reassortation, surface protein trading, etc, etc. I would point to the Spanish Flu as an example, but we've recently learned that that was actually the result of a regular drift, and in any case, the avian flu is a more modern illustration of the fine points. Studies have shown, in fact, that this particular strain resulted from the combination of H5N — " He faltered as he realized dead silence had fallen on the conference, and that Ellsworth looked close to crawling under the table across from him. "And...of course, in conclusion, the superflu is...therefore, not." He cleared his throat. "Not a result of any attempts of bioterrorism, that is."

Not the persuasive argument Ellsworth had been hoping for, but at least it served to shut Kelly up for the time being. Kelly, and everybody else present.

Lynn was the first to recover. "It's our recommendation that we focus on containment and control. The origins of the virus can wait until the population has been protected. I am not, of course, saying that we should ignore what the Director may feel is a potential threat. It may be a good idea once we have the quarantine in place to get some people looking into that angle of the situation, as well."

_Well played, Howard._ They both knew that the boys at Langley wouldn't have much to do either way. Why not send them chasing after matters of national security and appease Kelly all at the same time?

The President nodded. Made some general concluding statements, to which everyone nodded, too (as if they could do otherwise). Five minutes later, Ellsworth and Lynn remained the only two in the room. Even Tom had left, tugging his tie loose on the way out.

"I do believe we've conveniently left something out," Lynn said at last.

Ellsworth stood and swept his papers back into his folder, irritated. He knew Howard would mention that sooner or later. "Yes."

"You don't think we maybe should've told the President that we're in possession of an antiviral?"

"I'm fairly certain I mentioned oseltamivir." He was being childish, but he was too tired to care.

"I wasn't referring to that, and you know it."

Ellsworth tossed down his file. The papers he'd just organized fanned out across the conference table again. "Howard, do you know how _little_ of that we have in stock? They're going to be battling over the division of oseltamivir. We bring up the antiviral, we're going to start a nuclear war over who gets what!" He sank back down in his chair, one hand rubbing at his temple.

_God, what a mess. Project Blue. The burgs. It never went away. How many times had he suspected that this thing – this limbo – would come back to bite them in the ass?_

"A nuclear war might be nice," he muttered to himself. "At least we'd know what we were dealing with. Radiation. Environmental damage. Easy stuff."

"You're evading the subject, Sam," Lynn continued evenly. They both knew where this was going. "Look, we have them in store. They're right there. I hardly see why we should condemn every group to die just because you're too afraid of handling the hard questions as to why one gets it and not the other."

Ellsworth snapped his head up. "Don't you dare accuse me — "

"I know, I know. I'm sorry." Lynn paused. "That was unfair of me. But you know I'm right."

_And you know there's more to it, too._

He did. "I suppose." Sam sighed, heaved himself up from the chair. Having finally managed to gather his papers, he started for the door, with Lynn following beside him. "If you want, place the call. Tell them to pack it to the military."

"The military. Medical personnel would make far more sense."

"No. Doctors are ethical," Sam replied brusquely. "They'll spread it to their patients, demand why everyone isn't getting the treatment, create a huge riot. In any case, we don't have enough for all the doctors."

"So we're essentially sentencing the very people saving lives to death?"

The last of Ellsworth's patience burned out for good. "You said it yourself. If we use it, we can only use it on one group. So we're using it on one group. If you have a better idea, let me know. Otherwise, make the damned call. I'm going home."

He slammed the door shut behind him without bothering to wait for Lynn.

--o--

There was nothing better than a cup of steaming, black coffee at two in the morning. Lynn absently stirred the dark liquid with a blue _Papermate_ pen despite the fact that there was no sugar or cream to mix. There would've been back at USAMRIID, but he wasn't there at the moment, relegated instead to a temporary basement office at the CDC headquarters, which was Sam's nice way of throwing him a blanket and a couch for the night. He didn't mind all that much, really; it was eons better than the accommodations in Moscow when they were hunting anthrax dealers together. Another time, another bioweapon crisis. Now, it was almost twenty years later, and here they were again cleaning up the government's mess.

After a moment, he tossed the pen on his desk, splattering a few drops of coffee on a nearby memo pad, and picked up the phone. Lynn punched in the number from memory. If there was one thing he was good at, it was remembering DoD phone numbers.

Three rings total, the fourth cut off abruptly as someone finally picked up the phone. The voice that answered was distinctly feminine, but low and all business.

"Sarah Hills, Department of Operational Medicine."

"Doctor Hills." Lynn sat up in his office chair, elbows planted on the desk as he cradled the receiver in his left hand. "It's Howard Lynn. Do you have a moment?"

"Major." Hills sounded surprised to hear from him. "I can spare a few. What is it?"

"Samuel Ellsworth has informed me there is an antiviral you are in possession of," he said, getting right down to business. "What's the status on our supply?"

"One moment." Lynn could hear her shuffling aside papers and the scrape of a keyboard being pulled closer.

"Just give me an estimate," he said.

The click-clacking of keys stopped. "Our supply should be sufficient for at least 1,250 adults."

One thousand. Cutting it close, but... "That should be just enough."

There were a few seconds of silence. Then: "Major, that hardly makes a dent. There are more than a thousand medical personnel alone, never mind the addition of other vital services."

Lynn rubbed the bridge of his nose. "I'm aware of that, ma'am." He left it at that, trusting Hills would understand. This was the part he didn't want to explain. Damn Ellsworth for dumping the job on him.

More silence, a good thirty seconds this time. Then, quietly, "What do you mean by that?"

"I mean we are going to have to employ selective treatment in this scenario."

"You can't be serious," Hills said, trying to keep her voice devoid of emotion but failing to hide her incredulity. "You can't possibly pick and choose — and remove the medical personnel, of all people!"

"I never said medical personnel would be cut from the list."

"You didn't have to." He could almost hear the scientist bite back the word, _Bullshit_. "You said there was enough. If there is, then it can't be for the doctors, but it does appear that it _can_ apply to the number of military troops you'll be deploying into the hot zones." Hills paused, her anger dying out, and when she spoke next, she sounded merely pleading. "Why would you remove the one group who're saving lives?"

_Good question._ Lynn was tempted to say, "Because Sam Ellsworth told me to," in order to pass the blame, but that would...be juvenile. And probably ineffective.

Instead, he sighed. "Could you please just prepare the antiviral for transport, doctor?"

"I...All right. All right. I'll put my people on it right away. I suspect you don't want me telling them more than they need to know?"

"That would be appreciated. Thank you, doctor."

"It doesn't mean I agree in any way with what you're doing, Major," she said. "But I can...see the necessity, I suppose." Her voice was stiff, unconvinced. "Make sure this isn't used as a treatment, though. You'll cut the number of people we can save in half if it is."

"Noted." Lynn nodded curtly to himself. According to Ellsworth, the antiviral had potential treatment capabilities, lowering the mortality rate in patients by a good 10-20 in preliminary trials…that is, before the Project was shut down. But it also required a double dosage of the prophylactic amount, something they couldn't spare at the moment. "Is there anything else I should be aware of?"

"Actually, yes. I'd like to come along with the transport."

Lynn blinked. Damn. And here he'd been thinking he was almost done with this task.

"Ma'am, you must understand that – "

"I know what you're about to say, Major, but I have my reasons for this request. This antiviral is highly sensitive material. I'm not talking about confidentiality, but physical application." Sarah's eyebrows drew together, as she steeled herself for the task she'd set before her. "To be frank, I don't trust the military to handle it properly. We already have a limited supply as it is. I want to oversee the transport personally."

Lynn hesitated. This was outside Sam's instructions. He'd warned specifically – and Lynn had agreed with him – that they should involve as few civilians as possible, let no more than the minimum military transports access the drug. It was SOP for these types of situations. However…Hills _had_ worked in military research for a number of years, and she knew about the delicate handling of the antiviral, if not its original…source. They couldn't rely on just the Medical Corps to do the job. What she said made sense, and really — as long as the transport got to where it was supposed to, he saw no reason to bother fighting with her to keep her away.

Perhaps the fact that it was nearly 3:00 a.m. had something to do with his mindset.

"Agreed," Lynn said. "I'll have to clear it with Ellsworth, but I trust he'll understand your position."

Or...he would understand after a bit of discussion. The task would fall on him to convince his friend, but he suspected Sam was much too tired to argue for long, as well.

"All right," Hills said. "Get me a confirmation as soon as possible."

"Of course. Have a good night, doctor." Lynn waited for her to return the ironic parting words (the military had a real knack for irony) and hang up before he pressed down the switch hook on the phone, intending to place another call to Ellsworth. The man would no doubt be awake — if Lynn was up at this time, Sam most definitely was — but being awake was one thing; being alert and receptive to discussion was another. He paused midway to hitting the speed dial button. This was not a conversation he wanted to have at the moment.

Lynn set the receiver down in its cradle. Tomorrow, then.


End file.
